I think the question might be "How serious was he?" Initially, he was Barcelona bound but they wouldn't pay the money. We obviously offered more and now Chelsea seem to have topped that.

I'm not particularly disappointed. He's a good player but his best position is right wing and our first choice there is pretty handy. I would much rather we invest the money in central midfield.

I mean, if Chelsea doesn't come in with 65m and Barca can't pay I reckon we could've had him for around 50m (which would still be excellent money for a player unproven at a top club). We obviously mean business in this transfer window, but as we're looking at strengthening several areas of the team and our funds aren't limitless there is a ceiling to every deal.

While this is a bummer, I'm not that worried overall. We're going to sign a few more players, that much looks certain, and there are plenty of good players out there. I wonder if this means we renew our interest in Tielemans.

Moving away from Raphinha a moment. One interesting thing for me is in January we supposedly went very strong for Vlahovic, it didn’t work and now we have Jesus. They are two very different strikers in almost every way. It would seem strange that we’d change the entire focus and plan for team structure, style of play etc in 6 months.
So either, we were never really that strong for Vlahovic or, we were so you’d assume we still want a striker with a similar profile.

I still think we need a wide player. There seems to be some games where for whatever reason martinelli is less effective. If Pépé and nelson leave really we only have 2 natural wingers as Emile Smith Rowe and vieira look more like attacking midfielders. I wonder what our options are

I read an interview with Vlahovic where he said he didn’t even speak to anyone from Arsenal himself. If that’s the case how serious were we. I think there’s so few decent strikers about you have to just choose who is available

If our idea was to assemble a set of high quality interchangeable forwards, without a traditional no.9, rather like both Liverpool and City of recent seasons, then we probably need to look for another player of a similar ilk.

Martinelli and Emile Smith Rowe are both on that developmental curve which means that whilst talented they are frustratingly inconsistent.

I see that Dame Deborah James has died from bowel cancer aged 40 leaving her poor young children motherless.

Kind of puts things into perspective.

RIP

Moussa Diaby, 17 goals and 14 assists for Leverkusen last year, 22, can play wide left or wide right. Newcastle heavily linked. Price is similar to Raphinha
There were links to Gnabry but I think his wages might be prohibitive.

Some of the other right wingers we’ve been linked to seem to have had their great seasons in teams that predominantly counter attack, so they’re using their pace and directness in wide open spaces that they just wouldn’t get in a lot of games for us. I think this is why Raphinha felt a really good fit - he has pace and dribbling ability but can also operate in tight spaces with technique and skill. His workrate is very high as well - as you’d expect from a Bielsa player

I was told by a close friend of Gnabry that he was not willing to leave Germany for family reasons.

To be honest if you offered half the fee for Raphina to Saka to get him to sign a new contract without a release clause I’d prefer that anyway.

Then use the other half to sign another wide player who is a younger prospect or a player more naturally comfortable on the left

I'm not quite getting it right now. We seem to be collecting 5'7 attacking midfielder/winger/no10 types, of which we are fairly well stocked already. Even the defender we are linked to seems rather pint-sized. I would love to see some muscle down the spine.

We aren’t well stocked

If you sell Nelson and Pépé which I expect you only have 2 natural wingers in the squad in saka and martinelli. Honestly I consider it a minor miracle Saka hasn’t suffered a major injury yet the way he gets kicked so much. You need 1 more to cover both positions.

Also on our left side we are a little unbalanced it can be improved.

Fair enough. I just feel that CM and no.9 type would be greater priorities. But I suppose the market is pretty tough.

I'm inclined to trust Edu and Arteta, actually, even if what they are doing is beyond my comprehension.

With no Euroepan experience for a few years and anticipating us trying to balance that and the league, etc, I am not optomistic we will do too well. Probably get out of the group stages but don't think we'll get past 'decent' competition. We don't have the squad depth. We'll end up in the Europa Conference thingy probably. I think we'll still struggle trying to balance the league, domestic trophies and Europe. I hope I'm worried for nothing.

We'll have to wait and see. The league has to be first and foremost for us. It's going to be hard to tell where we may end up. Depends on who we get but also who Tottenham, Chelsea and Man Utd get in the summre window.

I don't think we should rule out West Ham as well. I actually wish them well. My hopes are for Palace though. Always liked them and with Paddy in charge, even more so.

I always knew Kroenke made his money in shopping malls and plazas around America. Like a lot of the 1% in America he's bought up a lot of raw land. They must know something the rest of us don't. Shopping malls and shopping plazas are closing all over America though. Amazon has bought up many of them as distribution points. So, I'm wondering if or where Kroenke has diversified his money into? Raw land, farm land doesn't make much money. The mall business is dying if not dead in America.

https://www.forbes.com/profile/stanley-kroenke/?sh=7d62e3a5742c

Every time I see we are linked with a player and the headline is Arsenal in a fight to get so and so with, take your pick, Tottenham, Chelsea, Man Utd, etc, I assume we won't get the person. If its Liverpool or City, we 99.99% won't.

Not sure if others feel the same. I don't think we can compete for players like we used to. Tottenham may seem a better project than we are these days and that's disappointing to adjust to mentally.

If someone offers £65m for Raphina and that's £15m above your valuation then that's just the game. Walk away and move on to another target.

Are you better paying £65m for Raphina or say £40m for a younger emerging talent + £25m for Tielemans. That's what you have to weigh up, especially where funds are not unlimited.

Chelsea and Man Utd are one thing, but Tottenham aren't signing players like Partey, Jesus and Pépé (who was enormously hyped when he signed for us). They're clearly a notch below us in that regard, even in our current state.

Exactly this. We can obviously afford £65m, but the question is what impact it would have on our other targets for the summer. Another issue is that Chelsea are reportedly willing to pay most of the £65m up front - with the amount of money we seem willing to spend it this summer we will probably have to be creative with the way we structure those deals in terms of add-ons, paying in installments etc.

Seems like Utd are going all in for Martinez now. The Ten Haag link may prove key. Would be a shame to miss out on two of our reported top three targets after all the hype of the last week or so.

That’s why I’m so dismissive of transfer gossip. My advice remains, wait until signings are confirmed on Arsenal.com before getting too excited. While I accept the photos of Edu and Jesus make it likely he’ll join (assuming they’re genuine and recent), it isn’t impossible that the medical could find a surprise problem or issue with him.

I read it was all done and 100% ok with only the announcement to come. I honestly think sometimes the delays can be due to getting all the social media content ready to go. Working in this area myself these days you shouldn't underestimate how much work is needed to create and edit the little animated announcement videos or the videos of the signing, player being shown around the training ground etc. It would take a good full working day to produce some of this stuff.

Yeah, the Jesus deal is done, it's just that Arsenal are notoriously slow with official announcements of new signings. Several sources have reported the medical is done, and the deal is 100% signed. Don't think that's one we need to worry about.

Makes you wonder how Chelsea are balancing their priorities, they could go for £65m Raphinha and Sterling (£50m??) and yet their most pressing needs are CB. They’ve lost Rudiger and Christensen and Azpilicueta is a player I think is in sharp decline. Alonso wants out and Chilwell is coming off a very serious injury. They have Havertz and Werner as their two strikers having binned off Lukaku on loan. Their attacking midfield positions might just be the positions least in need of investment to an outsider.

Jess was pictured at London Colney getting out of a car and being hugged and greeted by Edu. It’s definitely done.

Getting a striker in was No.1 priority this window.

I’d echo those who want some more physicality in central midfield. That would have been my 2nd priority this window. Full back cover would be priority 3.

After those 3 positions it would be wingers/attacking mids.

The window is very early. If we’re bidding £50m for a versatile winger we certainly view it as a priority

Possibly their approach is to stop us getting much stronger.

Raphinha on picking Chelsea: I think they [Arsenal] has an exciting wingers in Saka & Martinelli which i don't see myself competing or starting over them, I want to make it to the world cup so i picked them bc i would get much game time playing for the 2nd best club in London.

Really? Is this true?

3rd bid made for Martinez. Man U are linked and would be a genuine threat given Ten Hag was his last boss, but Man U have just had a bid accepted for a left back. But maybe they can give Martinez more assurances on game time whereas for us he might be 1st choice back up in 2-3 positions

Wasn’t the picture of him being hugged and greeted by Edu taken when he arrived for his medical? Apart from the football fitness stuff, the medical will also include a full blood count. That will cover everything that can possibly be checked by a blood test. As soon as that’s done, it will inevitably take a while before the results are known which I’ve little doubt will coincide with the social media stuff being prepared which Darren mentioned.

It’s possibly about a one in a million (perhaps more) chance, but if the blood test found he had something like early stage leukaemia, there’s no chance Arsenal would go through with the signing. It is still too early to say it’s definitely done. It will be confirmed on Arsenal.com once the social media stuff has been done AND the outcome of the medical, including the blood test results, are known.

Extremely or massively likely - yes. Definitely done? Not quite.

Blatantly made up quote. He’s not even signed yet

Uh oh

News breaking that Gabriel Jesus move has fell through because club doctors diagnosed Human papillomavirus infection (HPV). He will now have to go back to city.

This just isn’t our week. Not sure what happens now.

Top Gun having a joke one assumes.

He is not a left back though. Who knows what type of formation Man Utd will employ next season? Ajax were very attack-focused but quite exposed at the back. It remains to be seen whether or not Ten Hag will set Man U up the same way. I'd say one of his main priorities will be to find a centre-back partnership that works.

I read a piece on spending to stand still. It is relevant to spurs and Chelsea and to some extent Liverpool. Spurs have two loan players they need to spend £75m to make the deals permanent this year or the next. Chelsea have lost two CB for free and Liverpool have had to double the money they received for Mané to try to replicate what he gives them.

Save for Lacazette we’re in a position to hopefully just push on from last year without having to take any backwards or sideways steps/spend

I presume you are having us on, because all I get when I google is variants "Jesus healed me of the clap"

If this is anything to go by, more the highest bidder and player choice obviously.

https://theathletic.com/news/raphinha-c ... WdbbuZc1q/

serious unfortunately.

Isn’t it highly infectious ? If he used the toilet or facilities he could have passed this to Edu or other staff. Our bad luck is incredible

Few of us told by an ex share holder earlier. It’s not public. Media hasn’t caught on yet as the City PR team are working out how to dress it up.

I’m hoping that this is not true. Fingers crossed.

If it is true then it won’t be a secret for very long.