I don't think Keita would have come to Arsenal anyway. He is liked a lot by Pep and used in their rotation system. He played 35x for them last season.

How available is Rolando from Porto? Better fit for Arsenal.

Yeah this is something I found strange as well.

From my POV it just seemed to come down to Arsenal having that much respect for Fabregas that they felt they had to let him go, even at a below value price. He wanted to leave, what? Two years ago? He gave them great service during his time in North London. I don't really fault them for doing what they did nor do I have a problem with them bidding that kind of money for Gotze. Special talent.

probably down to wages as well?
doubt players like keita/affelay would have been willing to take serious wage cuts to join arsenal

40M for Modric must be bollox or it would be all over the place by now surely?

M'vila to Arsenal. 25m or something?

Apparently not, DUCY?

Tbh I don't think Götze is interested in moving to Arsenal. If I'd have to guess he'd probably only move to 3 clubs: Barca, Real, ManU.
I remember him saying that he's only interested in playing for a club with great tradition and that he doesn't like the "artificial" (i.e. a rich guy with loads of money) clubs so I'd guess Chelsea and City are no real options.

He's supergrounded and down to earth (still lives with his family heh) and I doubt money is going to be a huge issue for him. My guess would be that his mindset is kind of "I'm set for life anyways, where can I develop best". If we have a decent showing in the CL and qualify again for next season I wouldn't be shocked to see him extend with us a la Müller/Schweinsteiger for Bayern (who both had better iirc).
He's probably interested in establishing himself on the national team as well, might even be his #1 priority at this point.

Bayern may or may not be an option as well (I hope not heh).

Re: Mertesacker...I'm a pretty big Mertesacker hater, he lacks any technical skills moving the ball up field but he has played quite well this year imo. Hope he moves to Arsenal because I think that makes it less likely he'll start for the NT (Hummels, Badstuber, Boateng, Höwedes are all better imo).

Since OAFK and apparantly cashy for some reason, are missing my point entirely I will try to explain it.

I am not simply comparing the fees.

Arsenal have had a world class talent in Fabregas whom they knew wanted to leave for a very long time. They have had all of this time to formulate a plan for how to move forward. Their plan, if they had one at all and it isn't clear they did, appears to have been to allow Barca to covet their talent for a long time, very publicly. Then allow them to lowball them and release him for what is clearly a ridiculous underpriced amount. Contrast this with Ronaldo at United, what was a quite broadly comparable situation.

Their plan then moved on to the next stage. Which was apparantly using all the Fabregas money and more to start pumping in huge bids for foreign youth prospects albeit very talented ones. This in the same summer as they have refused to bid a non insulting amount for English defenders, or buy a half decent goalkeeper in the past whatever number of years. This is absurd. What sort of plan was this? It screams of panic. They could easily have held out for a reasonable fee from Barca. Instead they just gave in in the end. Then hit the panic button and are trying to spend Liverpool amounts on foreign not-even for sale talents. In a situation where they have had this long to consider their options we can directly compare the fees. To just say 'market valuations ldo' as if we can't look at what is going on here and compare prices, to basically look at where Arsenal are going and what their rebuilding plan is ridiculous. We can do those things. We can compare the prices. We can discuss them. We can say wtf are Arsenal doing?

No.

Pretty sure we can say Spurz have got the better side of the deal if this is how much we pay for him. There are other options and if we are going to spend 40M, then we could do better imo.

Don't worry, our board is negotiating most likely and will end up parting with 50 Million somehow

Raz is totally right.
I am probably one of the biggest supporter of Wenger and think a lot of the criticism directed at Arsenal is ridiculous. However, it is pretty clear thay they did not handle the Fabregas situation that well. Maybe they have excuses, and it was tough to do better, but you cannot say that they made the most out of the situation.

Edit: A lot of Arsenal transfer rambling/speculation:

I think both Mertesacker and Santos are an indication of the desperate times, especially the latter I guess. But no doubt that help in both positions was desperately needed.

I've been critical of both in the past, but I can see Mertesacker being a good fit with his height, and experience at least, for teams playing the ball on the ground. Even if it looks overall clumsy sometimes.

Playing alongside Vermaelen or the pretty quick Kos (compared to Mertesacker's fellow Bremen-tower of the last few years the 1.98 cm Naldo) also looks like a good idea.

Mertesacker is slow though and when Bremen were playing a high line and were countered a lot, he was looking pretty bad, so for me that's yet another reason, it's still so important for Arsenal to find that very good offensive player that can help them regain control of their matches against most teams. Apply some real worries to the opposition.

The elite attacking talent would be Hazard or Götze. Those two have enough talent to potentially make Arsenal competitive with the best in the league. The availability is highly doubtful but I can't really see others who could have the same impact (including longterm) for Arsenal.

Maybe something totally out of the blue from Brazil, like Neymar, Lucas or Ganso but then there would also be some questionmarks when it comes to adjusting and then there is the competition from other big clubs in Europe. All in all, completely unlikely.

Sneijder and his astronomic wages that United allegedly were unwilling to pay, you just can't see happening either.

The solid category would be players like Lucho Gonzalez and Montolivo. Both looks to be available and are very good players who would definitely help, but not at all with the upside of Götze or Hazard, and certainly Wilshire and maybe Ramsey too would need to have excellent seasons.

Someone like Marvin Martin has the potential to create more than those two with his passing, but I would worry about the hype running a little too fast in his case.

Not exactly putting him in the one season wonder category or anything and he could still be the best signing for them, if Hazard or Götze are just too unrealistic, but I wouldn't call him a certain hit.

However there is no reason to get an older more worn version in for an example Arteta, even if he is proven in England, if Martin is available.

Moving well into dark horse territory, and still looking in France, I would actually think someone like Pjanic in general being a better fit in England than Martin. There is much less finesse playmaking sure, but more athletic and well suited for more direct play both with and without the ball. Also a potential scoring threat.

Then there is Stevan Jovetic back from very serious injury, but who before that, in my opinion, was showing things all the way up in the Götze/Hazard category. Fiorentina are currently trying to pin him down for a long term contract so if he is likely to avoid lasting negative impact from the injury, the time to get him for reasonable money, is now.

The most likely is probably none of them, and instead a very likely elite central/defensive midfielder in M'Villa and then hand the attacking-keys so to speak, to not least Wilshire and it's not like that kind of midfield trio (Ramsey,Song,Diaby maybe Frimpong the third entity) wouldn't be a better bet to compete with the strongest in England, than it would bringing in some of the aforementioned attacking names.

However, with Song and good looking defensive midfield talents in Frimpong and Coquelin, who both looks close to ready, Wilshire can play in that role too, maybe the M'Villa fix isn't as likely as I thought a few weeks ago.

Anyway, to make it all irrelevant, like it may very well deserve to be, Wenger will probably go for some teenager that no one saw coming.

Nevermind I'm dumb and grunched. Thought this was in reference to the Götze offer

I agree that wenger was somewhat delusional and never thought that losing cesc AND nasri in the same summer was ever an option.

using the cesc sale as benchmark for other purchases doesnt make any sense tho given that the numbers are screwed by a lot of different reasons(i explained above)

why not compare the prices with nasri instead? 25mil for a player in his last year of contract, clearly wanting away too

Surely Cole going to Lille paves the way for Eden Hazard to Arsenal?

I mean yeah I agree the overall strategy has been ****, but this is hours before the transfer window closes. I don't think overpaying for some players is a poor idea when you wake up in this particular situation this morning. If Arsene was canned after the United debacle and Arsenal had a new manager this morning being linked to the same exact moves, would you be as against them?

Again, for emphasis, the overall strategy has been god awful and that's really obvious, but they absolutely need some 11th hour moves here.

Going to be alot more productive when the window closes.

Apparently done deals:

Mertesacker:
Ok I guess. Probably comes to be a back up, and overall it gives them three ok choices in defense.
Park: Already given my thoughts. Good backup at a great price.
Santos: Meh, won’t be worse than clichy the past few years. They also probably have made money.

Possible targets:
Mvilla: Comes with potential question marks but could be especially usefull against the strongest team. If he comes, look for a real change a philosophy at Arsenal (less possession based-closer to the Henry Viera era). Could be interesting.

Martin/Pjanic: Still young and good passers, but there really is no point since they have Wilshere and Ramsey, who are the same kind of players, only better/more proven. Basically neither Martin nor Pjanic would help them this year.

Hazard: Extremely doubtful, especially given the circumstances of the Park transfer. However, if the Götze offer is true, who knows what could happen. Would made them a threat for top 3 though.

Don't think so they have lost lots of players already.

i would be fine with Mertesacker If we were to drop our highline

with cesc gone it doesnt make any sense anyway(maybe wenger finally realised this after the 8-2 trashing?)
we dont have enough possession and our front line isnt pressing enough to make it work anymore

if we bring another real quality midfielder in and change our style of play completely(similiar to our 05/06 style where we reached the cl final by playing great counterattacking football and not conceding a goal for like 13 games straight or sth like that) we can really surpise a few football this season i think

Mertesacker at least satisfies the "player I've actually heard of" requirement, which is always nice.

Meh my little read on Arsenal:
I think 4-2-1-2-1

................Sezzers.....................
Sagna...Mert......Verm.......Santos
...............................................
............Song..M'vila...................
................................................
................Wilshere.................
...Theo/Hazard.......Gervinho/Hazard
...................RVP....................

With decent bench:
1 of Hazard/Theo/Gervinho
Kolscieny
Djourou
Ramsey
Frimpong
Ryo
Park
Chamakh
Arshavin

Plus a few others I'll have forgotten.
Would give them more defensive stability with Mvila/Song or Mvila/Frimpong

.

Yeah good points. Also with Horizon's M'Villa points in mind.

Actually most of the names thrown around would thrive in that as well.

To bring in another (and the potential Dortmund soul-crush to the next level - it's still unlikely stuff though), one of the arguments for Wenger in recent years has always been, who on earth would be better, who could replace him. The risk of someone ruining a lot of great work outside the pitch would just be too great. Well for me, there is Jürgen Klopp, he has done great work building in Dortmund, fantastic with young players, and tactically he is excellent, with his kind of football (the young German way you could say) along with someone like Villas-Boas and his detailed take, the more likely future for football (including for the talent at Arsenal) than the unique stuff going on at Barca almost requiring their particular DNA. It's probably not the realistic way to win for everyone, let's just say that.

Does Juve even need Elia?