Nobody will dispute the fact that Arsenal would have greatly benefited from a striker signing this summer. Now that his team boasts a formidable defence, Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal could have posed a formidable threat to opponents if a clinical striker had also joined.
Victor Osimhen is one striker Arsenal could have recruited; the Nigerian international had a disappointing season last year, but he has shown himself a lethal attacker in recent years. Given that it was evident that Victor Osimhen was leaving Napoli; he’s not in Antonio Conte’s plans, and it looked they’d struggle to sell him due to lack of interest from other teams, why didn’t Arsenal take the initiative to bring him to North London?
The BBC have reported: Osimhen is at Napoli’s pre-season training camp but, according to Naples-based journalist Vincenzo Credendino, the Nigeria striker is only there to keep fit.
“He’s not playing friendly matches against other teams,” Credendino, who reports for CalcioNapoli24 TV, tells BBC Sport.
“Sometimes he doesn’t play the matches between the Napoli players. He just tries to keep himself in a good shape but he’s not risking anything because he’s very likely to leave Napoli sooner or later this summer.”
According to the latest rumours, Chelsea is now hoping to take him on loan as Romelu Lukaku leaves Stamford Bridge to join Napoli.
If Napoli are entertaining loan bids with no one willing to pay the players’ £110 million release clause, Arsenal should have sought to hijack the Chelsea swoop and sign the Serie A hotshot on loan.
However, if Mikel Arteta really wanted Osimhen, we’d be pushing for his signature, much like we did for Mudryk before he joined Chelsea. This lack of interest in Osimhen is a clear indication that the club has a different plan.
Fortunately, after Mikel Merino joins Real Sociedad, we’ll find out what that plan was. Could Arteta be eyeing a mysterious striker that isn’t Osimhen? We’ll have to wait and see.
Darren N
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I doubt Osimenhn would be a good fit for Arsenal because of his playing style and, especially, his attitude.
Arteta what he doesn’t want in his team
@ CoporateMan. Many of you make blanket statements. A player who received racial slurs from his own club and handled them professionally is a player who has an attitude? Osimhen is not an Arsenal fit and a striker who couldn’t score an empty net in Jesus is a perfect fit. If you hate the striker, just say so. After yesterday’s game, we need a top nine, and right now, that’s Osimhen and Gyokeres
I thought Viktor Gyokeres was targeted by Arsenal yesterday and that they are negotiating a fee with the club following the players agreeing personal terms with Edu.
This striker business with Arsenal changes daily, it’s hard to keep up.
Better then what we have
From reports, the about £80M price is still too high for Arsenal
It doesn’t change daily for Arsenal…only omnsites like these and in the media !
So far, we’ve committed to paying Chelsea £65M and have spent at least £15M on Havertz’s wages (300k+ per week for 52 weeks). While he did help us last season, let’s be honest, we didn’t win anything, and he lacks the finishing ability to lead us to trophies. That’s about £80M spent without significant improvement. Imagine a scenario where we hadn’t spent that money. We likely would have still achieved a top-four finish and had the cash reserves to get a top striker like Gyokeres or Osimhen. That’s why I always insist the opportunity cost of having Havertz is high; what we are losing by having him in the team is more than what we are gaining.
Havertz weekly wage is £235k, stop believing the 🐂💩 in the media.
What is your source and why is your source more trusted than the others?
Well David Ornstein believes it’s £275 000.00 /wk making him a top earner at Emirates.
As if I’m going to put the legends name on here 😂😂
I mean transfer fee is one thing but including the wage’s is disingenuous in my view, Arsenal have the space to afford to pay both Havertz’s wage and any top strikers wages in the future, the team is not at the limits of its wage budget. Heck Havertz was brought in as a 8 anyways so it’s not like it’s solely positional overlap preventing a move.
In Osmihen case the fee Napoli demanded is unlikely to be one arsenal could afford, if they had say the 65 from Havertz fee saved they’d still need to spend 35 + add ons on Osimhen. Given he wasn’t available for sale last summer I doubt Arsenal would have expected this.
As for Gyokeres even if Arsenal had the transfer money to spend, I doubt they’d meet his evaluation. It does not seem like the transfer department would be willing to spend ~80 mill on a guy whose never played in any of Europe’s top 5 leagues, and is a season removed from the Championship.
Arteta prefers Havertz. He wants our forwards to press opposing defenders hard. Havertz does, Osimhen doesn’t. Neither would Toney. Sesko didn’t come because he would be second fiddle to Havertz Arteta wanted him because he was small relatively cheap and he believed he would develop as he wanted him to. Even Gyokeres isn’t sure she’ll be first choice or Alvarez. He probably isn’t burning for a striker this year. Merino is enough for him and he can step in next year for Sesko. Let’s not complain. Havertz is not bad, he is not a finisher like Haaland but he does things that other strikers don’t. If he wasn’t good, he wouldn’t be Germany’s main centre-forward. We also have Jesus.
I don’t think you’ve seen Osimen play. I’m not saying he is the best fit for arsenal but that guy presses. Talk about injury or the fee, he’s better than Havertz in ever department as a forward
I have seen him. He is good, especially on counter attacks. But we don’t know how he will do in the Premier League. Furthermore, I don’t think we can afford to buy both Merino and a top striker. Here, apparently, Merino is not progressing, because the sale of the ESR is not finalized. You will tell me to sell Havertz. I do not think that this idea is embraced by many, especially those who decide.