With Arsene Wenger, nurturing a well established reputation of being cautious on transfers and bemoaning the ills of “financial doping”, Arsenal’s linking to a number of this summer’s most talked about transfers and especially to the blockbuster deals comes as something of a surprise. Six of the most visible summer transfers involve the Gunners including the distinctly unsuccessful bid to woo Jamie Vardy from Leicester.

Some of the other linkages fall in the wishful category including Riyad Mahrez, Alvaro Morata, and Gonzalo Higuain, fan driven, and never serious transfer targets. Granit Xhaka and Shodran Mustafi’s on, off, and then on again after fan ire reached peak levels remain exceptions. In some alternate universe, Wenger would pay $100m for Higuain, just not this one.