By Tony Attwood
By no stretch of the imagination has this been a transfer window that could be called “one hell of a rush to spend money” – at least not so far as the top six from last season are concerned.
At the moment of writing the table of all the players in and out for actual money runs like this…
| Buying club | Player in | Cost | Player out | Buying club | Income |
| Arsenal | Martinelli | £6m | Ospina | Napoli | £3.5m |
| Ceballos | Loan | ||||
| Saliba | £27m | ||||
| Chelsea | Kovacic | £40.2m | Aina | Torino | £8.8m |
| Hazard | Real Mad | £88.5m | |||
| Kalas | Bristol City | £8m | |||
| Redan | Hertha Berlin | £2.3m | |||
| Liverpool | van den Berg | £1.3m | Camacho | Sporting CP | £5m |
| Ings | Southampton | £18m | |||
| Man City | Angeliño | £5.3m | Ambrose | Metz | £2.3m |
| Rodri | £62.6m | Pablo Marí | Flamengo | £1.5m | |
| Fabian Delph | Everton | £8.5m | |||
| Richards | Brighton | £2.5m | |||
| Manu García | Sporting Gijón | £3.6m | |||
| Luiz | Aston Villa | £15m | |||
| Man Utd | James | £15m | |||
| Wan Bissaka | £45m | ||||
| Tottenham H | Etete | £200k | Trippier | At Madrid | £20m |
| Clarke | £10m | Janssen | Monterry | £6.3m | |
| Ndombele | £55.5m |
Of course there are lots of players who appear to have been on the edge of signing for days and days, but as yet, we have no confirmation from the club.
But there has been the feeling throughout that Arsenal, alone among the clubs in the list above, was hampered by a £40m limit on spending.
However at the annual meeting between directors of the clubs and fans at the stadium last night it was made absolutely clear that the £40m, sometimes quoted as £45m, was an absolute myth. The exact phrase used from the platform was “I don’t know where that figure came from.”
Of course the trouble was that because we have had two months of the rumour that Arsenal only had £40m to spend while everyone has had much, much more, it seems some of the people at the meeting still did not believe the word from the directors. The attitude seemed to me to be, “well if you have got more money why haven’t you spent it?”
I think there was also a feeling of “Why didn’t you tell us before?” although to be fair on this one, the level of rumours is now so totally insane, that Arsenal would need a director for denying rumours to keep up with everything, if they were to answer the stories.
There is also the problem that at the same time as having the £40m rumour, Arsenal have been linked with Zaha at double that cost. Then suddenly Palace open discussions with Everton, and there is more anger from Arsenal fans who allege that Arsenal only have half the budget of Everton.
The fact is that over 80 players have been tipped to be coming to Arsenal this year. These stories, and all the stories around it are just nonsense. And the only criticism we can make of Arsenal until we window closes and we can see exactly who has come to the club and who has left, is that by never speaking about such matters until we have a fans meeting as we had last night, the rumours are not denied.
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Arsenal are thus caught in a trap. They don’t want to give away details of possible deals until they are done, for fear of other clubs trying come in and hijack a deal, but maybe when it is simply a statement like the £40m issue, they could have let us know a bit earlier, before the myth of £40m becomes accepted as fact by so many supporters.
- Danny Welbeck
- Julio Pleguezuelo
- Stephan Lichtsteiner
- Cohen Bramall
- David Ospina
- Jordi Osei-Totu (on loan to Bochum)
- Aaron Ramsey
- Bayli Spencer-Adams (free to Watford)
- Daniel Ballard (on loan to Swindon)
- Ben Sheaf (loan to Doncaster)
- Charlie Gilmor (loan to Norwich)
- Vontae Daley-Campbell (sold to Leicester for an undisclosed fee)
- William Saliba (on loan to St Etienne)
In terms of the team lists, the Arsenal official site is going through one of its regular bizarre modes by not including any of the players from the under 23s list in the first team squad, despite announcements that they have been promoted. Chambers and Jenkinson are however still there. It is these sorts of details that don’t really help the club.
So of Willock, Nelson, Smith-Rowe, Nketiah there is no mention – they are still academy players, at least on the club’s own site.
We can’t expect Arsenal to respond to every single rumour, but we could do with a little bit more information all round. And if they gave us some, the directors might have an easier ride than they got last night.