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Arsenal linked with shock deal to sign £60m Dutch international

By on August 29, 2017

According to a report in The Sun, Arsenal are now the front runners to sign £60m-rated Virgil van Dijk with Southampton keen to have Theo Walcott in part-exchange for the defender.

Van Dijk has been pushing to leave the Saints all summer and has been training on his own after handing in a formal transfer request at the start of the month.

The Dutch international has been tipped to join Liverpool for several weeks but Southampton are extremely reluctant to do business with them after reporting the Merseysiders to the Premier League for tapping up.

Arsenal have been credited with an interest for some time too but most people dismissed us from the race due to our lack of Champions League football.

However, that hasn’t deterred Arsene Wenger from trying his luck as The Sun reported last week that the boss had met with van Dijk and his agent to discuss a potential move to the Emirates.

The newspaper is now reporting today that Arsenal appear to be the new leaders in the race as Southampton are ready to do-business for the £60m centre-back if Walcott is included in any deal.

The 28-year-old is clearly out-of-favour at Arsenal and he doesn’t fit in to our new 3-4-2-1 system so it wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if we were willing to use him as bait to sign van Dijk.

It would be a superb piece of business if we could somehow pull off a cash-plus-Theo deal as van Dijk would be a sensational addition to the squad.

READ: £36m midfielder confirms he’d join Arsenal

However, I’m not holding my breath that anything will come of these reports as there is no guarantee Walcott will be open to the idea of joining Southampton.

If he had anything about him he would as he needs regular football if he’s to make the England World Cup squad but he’d probably need to take a pay cut and I don’t see that happening.

Let’s be honest, if van Dijk is to leave Southampton before the deadline, he’ll probably join Liverpool or Chelsea.