Gunners to splash £72m Arsenal to break club record to land Lille winger Pepe
London club to see off rival interest for winger United leave out Lukaku after Inter ultimatum
Arsenal are edging closer to completing a club-record deal for Nicolas Pepe in a move that will be seen as a major statement of intent ahead of the new Premier League season.
The Daily Telegraph understands that Arsenal are still finalising their move for the Lille winger, who will cost them around £72million, and remain hopeful of completing the signing soon.
It was a sign of how far talks have progressed that Jose Fonte, the former Southampton and West Ham United defender who now plays for Lille, said yesterday that Arsenal fans “will be in for a treat” with Pepe.
Pepe, who plays predominantly on the right wing, will add more pace and dynamism to an Arsenal attack which is already the club’s overwhelming strong point.
Arsenal have long been monitoring Pepe’s progress and they stepped up their interest earlier this month despite the weakening of their financial firepower following their failure to qualify for the Champions League for the third consecutive season.
At 24, Pepe is a younger option than Wilfried Zaha, for whom Arsenal made a bid earlier this summer, and it is understood that Lille have proven to be more receptive to a staggered payment structure than Crystal Palace.
Fonte described Pepe as a “very, very accomplished player” who will add a new dimension to an Arsenal attack that has lacked width since the departure of Alexis Sanchez to Manchester United in January last year.
“He is incredible,” Fonte told Talksport. “If he can reach the same level, which I believe he will, that he did with Lille last season then Arsenal fans will be very happy.
“He is super quick, he has a left foot which is silky, one v one he is second to none. He finishes really good, he takes penalties, he takes free kicks. He is a very, very accomplished player and I think Arsenal fans will be in for a treat, for sure.”
Pepe scored 22 league goals for Lille last season, finishing second in the Ligue 1 goalscoring charts behind Paris St-germain’s Kylian Mbappe.
He has made 15 appearances for the Ivory Coast, scoring four goals.
Arsenal have held off competition from some of Europe’s leading clubs to take the lead in the race for Pepe, who was also of interest to Napoli.
Carlo Ancelotti, the Napoli manager, insisted at the weekend that he was “not disappointed” by Pepe’s decision to pursue a move to the Premier League instead of Italy.
Meanwhile, Romelu Lukaku was yesterday left out of Manchester United’s travelling squad for tonight’s friendly against Kristiansund in Norway.
Lukaku was with United for their pre-season tour of Australia, Singapore and China, but the striker missed all four matches because of knocks. It is understood that Lukaku has been the subject of a failed €60million (£54million) bid by Inter Milan, with United giving the Serie A giants a deadline to agree a deal.
Over the weekend, a picture appeared on the 26-year-old’s social media accounts of him and his agent, Federico Pastorello, accompanied by the message “soon to be continued”. Lukaku’s name was then missing from the 26-player travelling party that United announced on their official website yesterday morning ahead of today’s match at Oslo’s Ullevaal Stadium.
Lukaku, after picking up an ankle injury, trained on his own on the eve of the final match of the tour, last week’s 2-1 win against Tottenham in Shanghai.
Defender Eric Bailly is also missing from the group who left for Norway after he sustained a knee injury in the victory over Spurs.
Sanchez is another not included after limping out of Chile’s Copa America third-place play-off match against Argentina earlier this month. Full-back Matteo Darmian is also absent.