Arsenal go for Guedes as Wilshere pleads for league start
ARSENAL will make a summer move for Paris Saint-Germain’s Goncalo Guedes as they look to rebuild after the departures of Alexis Sanchez and Mesut Ozil.
While Arsenal are expected to make a fresh move for another left-sided attacking player in Thomas Lemar next month, Guedes, 21, has also been identified to fill the vacuum left by the expected exit of the club’s best players.
Guedes is on a season-long loan at Valencia, where he has been instrumental in the club’s challenge to Barcelona in La Liga. With PSG under pressure from UEFA to balance their books after committing to £366million in transfer fees last summer, Arsenal are hopeful they can secure Guedes.
It will be new head of football relations Raul Sanllehi’s job to use his contacts gained at Barcelona to secure the Portuguese player.
Arsenal’s move for Monaco’s Lemar will not be for the bumper £90m they offered in August. That would have been funded by the £60m fee for Sanchez from Manchester City, but both deals collapsed after Lemar was reluctant to make the move at such a late stage in the window. It is understood he is now keen to move.
Meanwhile, Jack Wilshere believes he can make Arsenal better if Arsene Wenger trusts him to play. The midfielder has not started a Premier League game all season. But a string
of convincing cameo roles off the bench and a man-of-thematch display in Europe in midweek have prompted calls for him to start today against Southampton.
Wenger says that Wilshere’s fitness and form have made him a strong ‘candidate’ for selection.
Wilshere, out of contract in June, said: ‘It’s not just now that I want to play, I’ve been wanting to play for ages. I’ve spoken to the manager and he knows that.
‘I have to respect it is a difficult team to get into. But I think I’m good enough. I felt that even when I was a 16-year-old.
‘All you can do is feel confident that if you get the chance, you’ll hopefully improve the team.’