It is true Rich. It’s confirmed on Aston Villa’s official website. With Maitland-Niles already gone it leaves Cédric as the only right back when Tomiyasu is out.

https://www.avfc.co.uk/news/2022/januar ... s-signing/

Does Mari on loan and Chambers gone leave us with just 3 cbs and Tomiyasu who can play there at a push? Tierney as well I guess.

Chambers is another one in a pretty long list of players who's been mishandled at Arsenal in recent years. Should've just sold him a couple of years ago, we could've easily gotten 10-15m for him, and it was a long time ago he looked like someone who could be more than a bit part player at this level. Maitland-Niles is another one heading in the same direction - a year left on his deal this summer which will affect whatever fee we can get for him. At one point we had a bid of close to 20m on the table.

All of these missed transfer fees add up, and when we're sitting here all agreeing we need at least two starting players these things play a part in our ability to get them.

Does Mari on loan and Chambers gone leave us with just 3 cbs and Tomiyasu who can play there at a push? Tierney as well I guess.

Yeah, I think the plan for the rest of the season is White, Gabriel, Holding and Tomiyasu at cb, Tomiyasu, Cédric and Tavares at rb and Tierney and Tavares at lb. Might work, but it's a little risky.

So outs this month:
Mari on loan
AMN on loan
Kolasinac contract cancelled
Chambers permanent to Villa
Balogun on loan
And the club desperate to move on Aubameyang

From the 5 outs I reckon we probably paid up Kolasinac’s deal but saved the wages of the other 4 which I’d estimate at maybe £200-250k per week which is £5-6m saving until the summer.

When you consider the prize money on offer for champions league, europa or even just every place in the league on the face of it that seems a strange set of deals for players who could have been emergency back ups for a thin squad. Mari and Kolasinac and Balogun I understand but AMN and Chambers offered versatile back up.

Arsenal fans will go absolutely spare if we don’t add some players in the next 4 days

At the end of the day we only have another 13 games to contest. 3 centre backs plus Tommy might be enough. Saliba comes in next year

Shame Callum left. Good player I thought and always gave his best. Shame really

Isn't it 17 games? Not that thats a massive amount more.

Might have got the number wrong

Matt Turner is a done deal but for the summer £7m

If he’ll replace an outgoing Leno, I’ll be surprised if it’s not another weakening of the squad.

Probably but can a club like Arsenal pay a reserve keeper 100 grand a week.

Would make sense to run a tighter ship till we are back in Europe

Cutting it close again in the transfer market. We desperately need an established Striker and another box to box Midfielder.

At least the women’s team won 2-1 at home to Brighton after being 0-1 down at half time.

Guimares to Newcastle is almost done, it is 42m euros plus a further 8m euros if Newcastle avoid relegation. So a £42m deal. When you have unlimited money and are in Newcastle's position getting a player like this in isn’t a huge deal for them. Almost feels like when City got Robinho. As long as they stay up it doesn't matter if he is a success or not because it does more in terms of legitimises their ambitions and will attract others.

Newcastle will go crazy in the summer if they stay up. It is another 'sigh' moment for football though, how long before Newcastle are permanently in the Champions League places or winning titles? The wealth is like nothing we've seen before, it could be under 5 years

Guimares to Newcastle is almost done, it is 42m euros plus a further 8m euros if Newcastle avoid relegation. So a £42m deal. When you have unlimited money and are in Newcastle's position getting a player like this in isn’t a huge deal for them. Almost feels like when City got Robinho. As long as they stay up it doesn't matter if he is a success or not because it does more in terms of legitimises their ambitions and will attract others.

Newcastle will go crazy in the summer if they stay up. It is another 'sigh' moment for football though, how long before Newcastle are permanently in the Champions League places or winning titles? The wealth is like nothing we've seen before, it could be under 5 years

So with the American GK not coming in until the summer I presume that means Leno stays until then also. Then he'll have 1 year left on his deal so we'd probably be lucky to generate much more than £10m for him. At 29 he's still quite young for a GK.

Barcelona and Juve have made official approaches to take Aubameyang on loan until the summer.

If we can't get a striker in you'd have to turn it down.

However, if we can and if we want to be rid of Aubameyang permanently in the summer (still 1 year left on his deal at that point) then sending him on loan to a huge european club in the hope he gets some form and entices them to move permanently wouldn't be the worst strategic move

Saw this table in twitter.

There are some obvious mitigating circumstances in there. Also shows the best sales have come from academy players.
T\he glaring ones are probably getting no fee for Ramsey, Wilshere and Welbeck. And then also almost being forced to release certain players for free because of their age and size of wage/contract.

Özil obviously stands out as well

Saliba was named in the French league team of the week for the 8th time this season. If we hadn't already signed him we and many others would be all over him. We need to make sure this goes right when he comes back in the summer.
Every top club in the world is looking for CB who are: Tall, quick, strong, technically excellent, good passers, front foot defenders rather than sliding tackle types and young........ Van Dijk kind of raised the bar here and that is what everyone is now looking for.