Mikel Arteta has stressed that Arsenal\u2019s reported \u00a360 million pursuit of Eberechi Eze is a planned decision and not simply a reaction to Kai Havertz\u2019s latest knee problem. Arteta confirmed Havertz will miss Saturday\u2019s Premier League clash against Leeds at the Emirates, though the full extent of the Germany international\u2019s layoff remains unclear.<\/p>\n
Club sources say news of Havertz\u2019s injury reportedly accelerated the pursuit of Eze, a move that would take Arsenal\u2019s summer spending to around \u00a3250 million. Eze is understood to have undergone his medical on Friday, with the transfer potentially finalised this weekend. An Eze mural has appeared already.<\/p>\n
While Arteta did not formally confirm the signing, he denied the club\u2019s activity was a knee-jerk response. “Obviously we were very active trying to look at the possibilities that could come,” Arteta stated. “We are not reacting to anything, we\u2019ve been very prepared and understanding what we could do and we have decided this is the moment to do it.”<\/p>\n
Eze was absent from Crystal Palace\u2019s 1-0 Conference League play-off victory over Fredrikstad on Thursday, with manager Oliver Glasner confirming the England international had played his last match for the club. Should the transfer proceed, Eze would join summer arrivals Viktor Gyokeres (\u00a355m), Cristhian Mosquera (\u00a313m), Martin Zubimendi (\u00a360m), Kepa Arrizabalaga (\u00a35m), Christian Norgaard (\u00a310m) and Noni Madueke (\u00a348.5m).<\/p>\n
Those signings underline Arsenal\u2019s objective as they aim to clinch their first Premier League title in 22 years and to end Arteta\u2019s personal trophy drought since the 2020 FA Cup. “We are showing the ambition that we are here to win major trophies and to keep evolving and improving every single year and that comes with demands and those demands are clear,” Arteta added. “And we want to be in front in the league, not just chasing or reacting or being behind, but in front of it and every decision that we make in every area of the club is to achieve that.”<\/p>\n
On Havertz, who had only recently returned from a three-month lay-off following hamstring surgery, Arteta offered an update. “He is certainly not fit for this match. Unfortunately, he picked up an injury and we don\u2019t really know yet the extent of it,” the manager explained. “We need a bit more time and some more tests and after that we\u2019ll have more clarity. Mentally he\u2019s in a good place. He\u2019s a really strong boy and very committed. He had an incredible recovery from the hamstring surgery. He\u2019s suffered a setback. Let\u2019s see how bad it is but I\u2019m sure he\u2019s going to deal in the best possible way. He has the joy of a kid and hopefully we\u2019re going to have him back soon.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Arteta insists Eberechi Eze signing is planned, not a response to Kai Havertz’s knee injury. Update.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1965,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[192],"tags":[414,294],"class_list":["post-1963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arsenal","tag-eberechi-eze","tag-mikel-arteta"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1963"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1963\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1964,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1963\/revisions\/1964"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1965"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}