After what seems a lot of newspaper speculation over the price, it seems Arsenal have agreed to pay £55m for Viktor Gyökeres with extra money for what are being called add-ons. The further speculation is that overall the price will rise to £70m.
So he joins Martín Zubimendi from Real Sociedad for around £60m, Christian Norgaard for £10m and Kepa Arrizabalaga for around £5m hav also joined. Add ons can of course increase all prices over time.
And the media are fairly certain that Noni Madueke is about to sign for around £52m from Chelsea . That makes it five players if those yet to complete the signing actually do come in. Coincidentally, that is the same number as Liverpool and Tottenham are reporting to have brought in. Chelsea have so far confirmed six players in for a fee, although to be clear, that comparison is not quite right since we are including Arsenal transfers that have not been formally announced.
The Telegraph has reported that “Viktor Gyokeres’ agent waives fee for brokering deal between Arsenal and Sporting Lisbon” Apparently that fee was going to be around £6m, which makes it look a generous move, although it is just possible that some way of getting some of that money to the agent might be found (but that is speculation on my part).
It might also be the sort of gesture that helps an agent ensure that he gets to represent a few other players along the way, which could easily make up the missing money. And it does suggest just how much agents are making out of transfers these days. This is especially so since the player himself made it clear he wanted to come to Arsenal.
Arsenal are balancing the numbers quite satisfactorily however, since not only were they below the 25 allowed senior players for the last campaign (registering just 22) they are also losing Nuno Tavares, Marquinyhos, Nathan Butler-Oyedeji, Kieran Tierney, Jorginho, Sterling, and Neto.
It is also interesting to note how much damage Sporting have done to their own reputation with players who might be thinking of heading their way, with their President coming out and saying things along the lines that he would not bow down to “blackmail and insults.” Not a very clever way to attract new players.
Although many in the media quote the notion that the new player was with Brighton and Hove Albion, the fact is he never actually played for that club, instead going out on loan and moving to Coventry City when he played 91 games and scored 38 goals. It was Coventry who sold him in 2023 to Sporting CP where he achieved the oft-quoted statistic of 66 goals scored in 68 league games, or 97 goals in 102 games of all types, according to other stats.
Arsenal now just have this week in England before flying to Singapore to start the pre-season schedule there and in Hong Kong.
However, it has been reported that Gyökeres has not done any pre-season training with Sporting because of a dispute over his transfer, so we may not see him until later in the pre-season events.
For the media, however, this presents a problem since it looks rather like Arsenal being successful in the transfer window this time around, and there is still talk of Christian Mosquera coming to Arsenal from Valencia. It is also said that he has agreed on personal terms. Trossard is said to be going to Saudi Arabia, although the number of players actually making that trip appears to be declining all the time, as awareness of what life is like (especially for any wife or girlfriend who accompanies her partner to that country). And indeed, it is also being reported that the standard of the Saudi league is not what it was made out to be.
So, beyond all that it is likely that the media will start trying to stir up the notion that Ethan Nwaneri will not be sold to Chelsea after all. Myles Lewis-Skelly has also apparently signed a new deal.
Of course, there is always talk around multiple other players – and there seems to be an interesting increase in the policy of clubs not denying certain rumours concerning players they actually have no interest in signing, simply to keep journalists off the scent. Whether clubs are also deliberately trying to mislead other sides by sending them on false trails (as if “if Arsenal are after him then he must be good”) while keeping them away from the club’s main target, we can be sure, but it does seem unlikely that all the false stories of possible transferss were dreamed up by journalists on their own.
