Havertz doesn't like playing CF. he was deployed there at Chelsea and it didn't work out.

I know someone who joined spurs as a member only last year. He actually supports another club but wanted access to some premier league games. Got an email today offering a season ticket. They are offering tickets to their tier 2 members and there were thousands available he said. All is not rosy in the Tottenham garden folks

We do seem to be bending over and asking for it by taking so long over getting the deal done. Deja vu.

Told you.

Explain the logic in letting Thomas Partey speak to the Saudis whilst Rice wasn’t wrapped up.

Apparently we offered the whole fee in 6 payments over 6 years, literally never going to get accepted. This has gone for a burton this one.

Yes, no-one saw that coming. You and AG - with his clairvoyance about Newcastle winning trophies in seasons to come, based solely on the Tynesiders being cashed to the eyeballs - really ought to give yourselves the heartiest slaps on the back. Spooky.

If a Rice is just as happy to go to City as he is to come to us then we don’t really stand a chance. City offer him a more immediate route to trophies, they’ll be able to offer West Ham more money or more favourable terms and can offer Rice more money.

If he does go there I can already see the moaning from our fans and pi$$ taking from the media and rival fans laughing at ‘penny pinching’ it’s all nonsense. If we bid what West Ham wanted and City wanted him all it would have done is made City act quicker than they’ve had to - and we’re only 2 weeks in to the window! What are we meant to do? Offer so much money that it blows City out of the water??!!

If City make a bid that is accepted then we either match it and let the player decide or pull out and go after our next target - which should be Caicedo for me

Didn’t claim to be Nostradamus just said I saw it coming. Go back to polishing your knob please

If they get Rice everyone is literally playing for 2nd place. They don’t even really need him

Also the very public nature of the Rice saga is totally down to West Ham, it suits them to leak details of bids and encourage other bidders.

Charming. Tell us again, though, why you needed to pat yourself on the back for stating the obvious?

Crazy really. They signed Phillips as the best young England holding mid to add some competition for Rodri who is the best in the business. They lost Gundogan but signed Kovacic.
How many games would Rice play there? How many did Phillips think he’d play? Clearly the lure of money and to be fair more importantly the guarantee of trophies is too much to resist even if you know you aren’t first choice.
I don’t know what more Arsenal can do?
Some will say that we knew West Ham’s price so should have just paid it - which is ridiculous on so many levels.

Apparently West Ham want over £100m with half paid now and half paid in 6 months/ 1 year. Virtually no deals get structured that way with so much up front unless it is a buy out clause and even then something can be negotiated. Usually payments are made in equal amounts over the length of the contract. West Ham may not like the amount or structure of what we’ve offered but for anyone to say it is abnormal or a pi$$ take is clearly wrong.
Bellingham was just sold for £88m. We’re already bidding over that for a player who is 5 years older.

Was it that obvious, not sure. Regardless please seek a hobby

Problem is signing a dutch centre back for 30 million is pointless if we sell partey, don’t get rice and have to play jorginho. Spunk the whole budget on him and havertz. Sell off all the deadwood and make difficult decisions on balogun or Nketiah

I have literally no idea who the plan b would be. Even if we got rice I think replacing parteys early season form would have been tough to be honest.

It’s weird it feels like it could be a seminal moment if we don’t get him really. Not sure how we can compete. I have to say splitting the fee over 6 yearly instalments is ridiculous by all means go instalments but that duration would never fly with West Ham.

I haven't got a clue how negotiations pan out between clubs, but I would bet that a host of rival clubs have asked West Ham to inform them of any bid so they can decide if they want to get involved. And no doubt we've got the same agreement in place for other players who we may be interested in such as Caciedo. So there is an inevitability about other clubs starting to voice their interest now that Arsenal's bids have been made. It may appear that we are being slow and therefore allowing other clubs to join the race, but that makes no sense. If you are West Ham you will do anything and everything to make this into an auction which is where it seems like its heading.

In the U21s, Emile Smith Rowe comes on in 79th and scores in the 94th.

If we’re putting £90m up for Rice currently and get outbid by City then put that money Brighton’s way for Caicedo. I honestly think Caicedo is that good that he could be talked about in the same company as Rice.

Lavia is the cheaper option. Zubimendi has a £50m buy out clause. Kudus at Ajax is a very good no. 8 option

I agree. It’s part of the business world in football. Arsenal make offer and agree terms with player. No offer will be accepted by the club at this time when you have a top class player who will no doubt go anywhere with the top clubs. He might say he wants Arsenal but him and his agent are just after money. If they lure another one of the big clubs into the bidding he will likely chose the place that has more money for wages and good chances of trophies ( not just qualifying top 4). And Westham just get more cash and better payment scheme. And that doesn’t even include the brown envelopes of untraceable cash. Holiday in some exotic locations to help sweeten it all. We might still get him but we will pay. And City know this. They did it with Alexis and United couldn’t help themselves. Ronaldo and now they perceive us as a threat they can trump us or make us pay silly money. It’s actually a good business tactic.

I keep seeing people talking about us signing Havartz but there is nothing on Arsenal.com

I warned people a few weeks ago not to get too heavily invested in the Declan Rice deal.

Trying to buy a player for £100m who is coveted by other top tier teams is never easy and historically we've not been great with these kinds of deals.

There is a sense that we seem to offer a quite competitive upfront fee but then some really quite unobtainable add-ons and maybe unattractive payment terms as compared to the monied clubs, as with the Mudryk deal.

City were always likely to show their hand at some point and they have an enormous pull for any player, both financially and football-wise, so lets see what happens.

If we get it done that's great, if not then hey-ho that's life for a club not quite at the top of the money league.

I remain pretty optimistic on the Rice deal.

The press love an ongoing negotiation. The longer the process, the more opportunities there are to introduce spurious new lines of narrative which the media-reading public lap up. Nobody would be surprised if some of this new interfering chaff emanates from the selling club who are trying to create some jeopardy in the hope of driving up the price.

There are no facts here but we can be reasonably certain that we have been in contact with the player for many months and that he wants to join us. It also seems pretty clear that for family reasons, he wants to stay in London. That counts for a lot.

Having said all that, I agree with Soc. If he changes his mind and goes somewhere else, so be it.

I do think that at £100m+ Rice is a tad overrated, and I say that whether we get him or not.

For that kind of money you'd really want a gamechanging striker or offensive player.

Hi Soc.

If there was a modern day PV4 available, I'd pay that much for him. Very important role I think for the way Arteta wants to play.

(Btw I'll be signing up to BT Sports next season, so won't be pestering you for links as much )

For that holding (and lone) defensive midfielder who do we think the best in the world are? And it can't be someone who plays in a 2 (and Rice only really plays close to a lone role for his national team not West ham), because doing that role on your own is so highly specialised.
For the best teams this player has to:
Be defensively superb, Intelligent, tactically brilliant, positionally brilliant, Physical, great stamina......and great first touch, progressive passing, receive ball under pressure, drive the ball forward.

There really arent many players in the world able to do this role.

How much would Rodri cost in today's market? I see him as the best in the world at this role. He's a £100m++ player easily

How much would prime vieira cost in this market?

Hed literally be worth as much as players like mbappe. Good couple of hundred million

New bid for Timber going in soon.
Timber and Havertz for likely £100m combined including add ons

Yep, you often don't get the gauge this because these world class players at their absolute peak rarely move, or if they do recently there has been a release clause or they've gone for free or their contract situation dictates a lower fee.

Henry in his prime in today's market would be a £200m player for sure. Vieira wouldn't be far off.

Looks like Mason Mount will end up at Man U, they've had a couple of bids rejected and will end up around the £55-60m mark for him. As it is a similar price and they are similar players there will be a constant comparison next season between Mount and Havertz.

I think Havertz suits what we need better than Mount. I think Emile Smith Rowe could be our Mount

The Rice thing is really interesting. As Arsenal fans we jump to the negative conclusion. But, what if we genuinely are Rice's only interest and Man City don't have any interest in bidding. West Ham desperately want a bidding war and are eager to show their fans they've driven the best price - so it wouldn't be unfeasible for West Ham to be leaking our bids to show clearly what they are rejecting and also mooting interest from the richest team in the country to try to force our hand to pay what they want

https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/nicolas ... ler/776890

Nicolas Jackson, striker ready to sign for Chelsea. Don't know anything about this guy.

Chelsea still have Broja, Lukaku, Fofana and Aubameyang as strikers! Absolutely bonkers squad

Twitter accounts saying Rice is a done deal. Not sure whether to believe them or not.

Sky reporting he's going to Man City so yes it's a done deal .

The source being Sky’s Italian correspondent. The reporting on transfers is a plague on common sense.

I spent the morning with a Chelsea staffer, he told me it’s done and dusted save for the formality of inking the paper. He also told me they have cut £62m of wages in the last seven days with the various transfers out. Also they are heavily involved with PIF, hence all the bodies moving east.

He also told me what Benzema was getting at Al Hilal (?) apparently he’s on £10m per month……. bonkers.

This is who Edu is trying to negotiate with. Its just going to be a nightmare start to finish

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/c ... 21418.html

£62m saved in wages and £100m odd in transfer fees….but they’ve still lost good players
Mendy, Koulibaly, Kante, Kovacic, Havertz….Mount on his way, Azpilicueta going to Inter for free (cancelled contract)
Their squad is still an unbalanced mess

I can’t understand so many people, and so many in the media taking the line of ‘West Ham have told Arsenal what they want, Arsenal need to pay it or they have bungled the transfer’

Eh, that’s literally not how any transfer has worked ever. Even infinite money clubs have some form of negotiation.

Let’s see if the same stories are run when Newcastle come to us for Tierney and we set the price higher than they want. ‘Just lay what Arsenal want Newcastle you numpties!’…..hmmm

Assuming all these chelsea transfers go through let’s look at their best 11
Kepa, James, Chilwell, Badisheile, Fofana, Enzo, Gallagher, Loftus-Cheek, Sterling, Mudryk, Nkunku

Subs. Silva, Cucurella, chalobah, Pulisic, madueke, Aubameyang, Fofana, Broja

It’s got holes and weaknesses all over the place still. Both full backs are great - when they’re fit!, virtually zero quality of depth in central midfield and up front it’s a mix of young and untested, past it and unproven in the league.

Still huge surgery required

On the one hand you've got people criticising Arsenal for massively overbidding for Havertz and on the other hand youve got people criticising Arsenal for massively underbidding for Rice.