Arsenal close in on £50m-rated Gabriel Jesus from Manchester City
Arsenal are increasingly confident that they are close to agreeing a deal to sign Gabriel Jesus from Manchester City. The Brazil forward wants to join Arsenal, who are expected to increase their offer which is short at present of City’s valuation of around £50 million. Arsenal’s initial bid, made in the past week, was believed to be worth up to £30 million but they are expected to increase it to get closer to City’s valuation. Mikel Arteta has made signing Jesus one of his priorities this summer and has overcome fears that the forward might look elsewhere after Arsenal failed to qualify for the Champions League. Jesus, 25, will enter the final year of his contract next month and has been offered to Tottenham Hotspur and Chelsea. Jesus scored 13 times and managed 12 assists in all competitions for City last season, though half of that tally came in the final seven matches. One of Arsenal’s problems during the past two seasons has been scoring. Last season they managed only 61 goals when finishing fifth (lower than five other clubs in the league), whereas they only scored 55 goals when finishing eighth (the joint-ninth most) the previous year. They are without a senior striker after Alexandre Lacazette’s contract expired this summer and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang left for Barcelona in January. Jesus can play across the front three and he knows Arteta from the Arsenal manager’s time as assistant to Pep Guardiola at City. Jesus wants to leave City for regular starts given that he will play second fiddle this season to Erling Haaland, who has joined them from Borussia Dortmund. He has also scored 19 times in 56 matches for Brazil, including in a 5-1 win against South Korea a fortnight ago. Arsenal have agreed a long-term contract with Eddie Nketiah, who would be the back-up striker to Jesus and likely start in Europa League and cup matches. The forward, who came through the Arsenal academy, is out of contract this month and appeared destined to leave until he was given a run in the side near the end of the season after Lacazette, Arsenal’s first-choice striker, was ruled out with Covid. The 23-year-old retained his starting place upon the Frenchman’s return, scoring five times, including twice in the 4-2 win at Chelsea in the Premier League. They were his first contributions in the competition. Arsenal’s other issue has been creating chances and they are confident of persuading Youri Tielemans, who will enter the final year of his contract at Leicester City next month, to move to the Emirates Stadium. Related Articles Premier League 3 hours ago
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Premier League Fixtures out TODAY The 2022/23 Premier League Fixtures will be released at 9am. Who will your team face first? Prem to ditch festive fixtures The Premier League will reportedly scrap the traditional fixtures between Boxing Day and New Year after the World Cup. The December 28 games have been axed this year in an effort to help ease players back from the World Cup following the tournament in Qatar. The normal fixture list for that date has been moved due to the concerns over the physical conditioning of players that will have returned to domestic duties on Boxing Day – just eight days after the final in Doha. Telegraph Sport says that the Prem “will announce in its club fixture lists on Thursday that its festive calendar will now only include Boxing Day, New Year’s Eve and Jan 2” this term. Morning, Arsenal fans Arsenal are telling miserly rivals to put up or shut up after pulling the plug on Lucas Torreira’s cut-price move to Fiorentina. The Emirates hierarchy are fed up with European clubs trying to sign their unwanted players on the cheap. And they have ruled that the days of the great Gunners giveaway are now a thing of the past as they look to get greater value for money in the transfer market. They are particularly irked by Fiorentina pleading poverty during negotiations for Torreira just months after using Arsenal’s interest in Dusan Vlahovic to squeeze £65million from Juventus for the striker. Fiorentina had agreed a £12.5million option to sign Torreira when they took him on loan last season. But they reneged on that pledge when it came to negotiations for a permanent deal and said they would go no higher than £7million. Meanwhile, the Gunners will report back at London Colney in less than two weeks before heading to Germany for their first match of the summer. The Gunners begin preparations for the 2022-23 campaign on June 27 as Mikel Arteta plots another shot at securing Champions League football. In other news, Arsenal will learn their 2022-23 Premier League fixture list at 9am this morning.
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