Could Arsenal really be about to land their second world class player of the summer?
Arsenal have made an uncharacteristic din in this summer’s transfer window, with big money having been splashed by Arsène Wenger on Calum Chambers, Mathieu Debuchy and marquee summer signing Alexis Sánchez. According to reports in Spain, the Gunners are keen to add Paris Saint-Germain’s star striker Edinson Cavani to that list. Could it really happen? Let’s take a look.
Arsenal have made a load of noise in the transfer window, without having really found a solution to their biggest problem — the lack of a good centre-forward. It’s all well and good signing Sánchez, but if Wenger plans on using the Chilean in tandem with the erratic Olivier Giroud, then the Gunners could well find converting their chances difficult for another season. Signing Cavani — who has scored an impressive career total of 137 league goals in 269 league games, and 78 in the three seasons before he left Napoli in Serie A — would certainly go some way to rectifying that problem.
What’s more, Cavani doesn’t seem to have ever really been able to settle in France, and his agent has appeared to want to engineer a move all summer. The presence of Zlatan Ibrahimović has often seen the Uruguayan played out of position on the flank, and he’d probably be happy with a transfer elsewhere.
Why it doesn’t make sense
Then again, that his agent is quite happy to spread rumours could well suggest there’s nothing really in these reports at all. Add that to the less-than-familiar journalist making the bold claim on Twitter, and there’s actually no concrete evidence to suggest the Gunners have ever seriously considered making a move for the unhappy Uruguayan, let alone for the £50 million price tag being thrown around in the papers. It’s looking like Cavani will have to settle for another season in Paris. The poor soul.
Likelihood it happens
Signing Cavani would turn Arsenal into a pretty scary-looking team, and solve their long-standing striker issue. However, Wenger doesn’t seem to be overly interested in replacing Giroud, either because he has more faith in the Frenchman than the rest of us, or he’s considering playing Sánchez as his central attacker this season. Until there’s more concrete evidence, the Cavani rumour just seems like the classic background noise of transfer silly season. Let’s give this an optimistic 2 out of 10 chance.
SB NATION
