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Reports: Arsenal Offer €43m Deal For Wenger’s ‘Top Target’

By on January 22, 2014

Arsenal have made their move for long-term target Julian Draxler after offering Schalke a package worth a total of €43m (£35m), according to reports today.

The German sensation has been a name strongly linked with a move to the Emirates over the past 12 months with boss Arsene Wenger admitting on more than one occasion that he’s a huge fan.

A deal was meant to have been close last summer before we signed Mesut Ozil, but Wenger retained his interest and supposedly wanted to bring the 20-year-old to north London at the end of the season.

It seems we’ve brought forward those plans after learning that Theo Walcott would miss the rest of the season with many newspapers claiming Wenger has made the attacking midfielder his ‘No.1’ January transfer target.

The Sun are one of several media outlets who are claiming that we’ve now made our first official move by offering Schalke €25m (around £20m) in cash plus Lukas Podolski – who’s valued by the club at €18m (around £15m) – making the total deal worth approximately €43m (£35m).

On the face of it these seems like an excellent deal for all parties. We get one of the best talents in Europe, pay Schalke a significant transfer fee, plus we give them a ready-made replacement who’s a German international with over 100 caps.

However, it doesn’t seem Schalke agree as the newspapers are claiming that the Bundesliga outfit have turned down the offer and are demanding the full €45m (£37m) that would trigger the attackers release clause.

Using Podolski as bait was an interesting move by Wenger and a strange one when you consider our current lack of options up front. I’m actually a big fan of the forward’s and think he’s a vastly under-rated member of the squad. When you consider that he’s scored 19 goals and provided 11 assists in just 35 appearances, he’s certainly proved good value for the £11m we paid Koln 18 months ago.

He’s also a very popular guy around the dressing room. The big problem would be that he would slip further down the pecking order if we do manage to sign Draxler, so it’s perhaps understandable that the boss tried to include him in the deal.

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It remains to be seen whether we’ll go back in with another bid, but I’m keeping everything crossed that we do and we can persuade Schalke to sell as he’d be a sensational signing and one that could just bring us the title.