Rumours swirling around that Granit Xhaka could be off to Roma in a deal worth £20million + add ons.

If the deal goes through, it is a good one all around.

Roma get a very good player who would be well suited to the slower, Italian football. Xhaka gets the fresh start he perhaps needs mentally. And Arsenal get a decent chunk of cash.

A few people have questions the fee, highlighting that Arsenal paid £35million for him so selling him for £20million would be a £15million loss. This is incorrect and a narrow way of thinking.

Xhaka has been at the club for 5-years. His original fee would have been fully amortised across the accounts during the time. That means for accounting purposes, we have no more of his transfer fee to write off.

So from the accounts point of view, the £20million (if paid upfront) will be considered pure profit. We do not have to offset any of the incoming fee against what we paid for him originally.

It also needs to be taken into account that when we signed Xhaka at 23-years-old, he was considered one of the best midfielders under 25 in Europe. 5 years on and his star has waned.

Add in the fact he only has 2-years left on his contract, and wants out, Arsenal can not exactly sit their and demand a huge fee.

I am slightly concerned about Arsenal being linked with Ruben Neves.

He just seems a younger a version of Xhaka with the same strengths and weaknesses.

Neves has a good range of passing, scores the occasional screamer, but is slow across the pitch.

I guess where he is an upgrade is he does not have the “brain farts” that Xhaka does. And if you take away Xhaka’s mistakes, he is actually a decent central midfield options.

Would he be a good replacement? An upgrade? A debate for another day.

Bit of non-Arsenal news and some commentary on what is happening over the cricket.

Ollie Robinson was found to have made some racist and sexist tweets nearly 10 years ago. He made his debut for England last week. He has now been suspended.

Wisden have since “uncovered” tweets from another England player made when he was under 16.

This is going to happen more and more as players breaking through have grown up in the social media world. You will get more sports stars being “exposed” from messages they sent on WhatsApp, Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, etc has a child.

Now firstly I understand that Robinson was not a child when he made the messages. But he was already a professional cricketer.

So surely he should have been punished back in 2012 and 2013 when he made the tweets. Not 9 years later?

Likewise the England player who was under 16.

We have all done silly things as an adolescent. Whether it is said something we shouldn’t, stolen from a shop, smoked a bit of weed. The question is should you be “punished” for what you did at 14 or 15 when you are 23 or 24?

My feeling is that if the punishment was not handed out when the incident happened, they should not be handed out at all.

It can not be a case of “oh he is in Kent’s second XI, it does not matter what he Tweets”. And then 8 years later “Oh he is now an England international. Lets suspend him for something he said 8 years ago”.

Now I am not excusing the behaviour of Robinson as a 19 year old. But what I am saying is suspending him 8 or 9 years later just because he is now playing on a bigger stage is wrong.

The same will happen in football.

How long until you get someone who has risen up through the leagues like a Jamie Vardy, go on to make their England debut only for someone to find Tweets they made 10 years earlier as an 18-year-old?

As above, more and more players have grown up during the social media era. And as a result these sorts of stories will become more and more regular.

If what they said 10 years ago was not deemed punishable then, when they were a professional, it should not be punishable now.

Punish players for tweeting racist and sexist comments. But punish them when they said it. Not 9 years later just because they have risen to a bigger stage.

The only reason Robinson has been suspended is because he now plays for England.

Keenos

Here we go again.

1. Media link Arsenal to player
2. Fans either get over excited or slam club for “targeting” player
3. Player signs for another club
4. Fans criticise club for “losing the race” to sign said player

If Arsenal wanted to sign Emi Buendia from Norwich City. We would have done.

We have not “lost out to Aston Villa”. We made the decision not to sign him.

Reports of a “bid” in the media last week were well off the mark. This is just speculation made up by the media, or by those on Twitter that crave the attention.

The fact is, no one actually knows who Arsenal have or have not bid for. Transfer business is a closely guarded secret by clubs.

The majority of speculation usually comes from agents. And they basically lie about bids or interest in their client in the hope bids elsewhere materialise.

And this is probably what happened with Buendia.

His people used the name of Arsenal to generate the interest, and by the end of the week a deal had been struck for him to join Aston Villa for a £35million deal.

Now we can debate whether Arsenal should have been in for Buendia.

He is a fantastic talent. A really nice technical player. The sort of player that we need.

But there is also something to say that he has ended up at Aston Villa and not one of the 10 clubs who finished above them.

There is a huge step up from Championship to Premier League. Buendia’s stats from last year in comparison to the season before show that. So you can kind of see why clubs were perhaps sceptical about spending big on him.

Ultimately, we will only really know if Arsenal were right not signing him when we see who we actually sign – and how they perform in comparison.

Say we go and sign Jack Grealish from Aston Villa, or add Houssem Aouar. Both similar players to Buendia but better.

You also have Martin Odergaard who spent the 2^nd half of last season on loan

There are reports that Edu and Arteta prefer Odergaard.

“We have a very clear and strong opinion on what we would like to do,” said Arteta when asked about keeping Odegaard.

“He’s not our player. We will have discussions in the next few weeks. And respect first of all because he’s a Real Madrid player, and we will have those communications.

I always advise during the off-season that you are best off ignoring the attention seekers.

The media use transfer speculation to drive traffic to their sites. The same as those blogs who constantly write about transfers (obscuring the players name from the title). It is click bait.

And then following it up with an article that “Arsenal lose race to sign” a player gets them even more hits.

Those saying “Arsenal are a dead a club. Can’t even beat Aston Villa to the signing of a player” really need to take a look at themselves.

Manchester City, Liverpool, Chelsea, Manchester United, Leicester City, Tottenham, West Ham, Everton and Leeds also have not signed Buendia. Were they all beaten to his signing? Or do they all have targets elsewhere?

Arsenal were not beaten to the signing of Buendia. Arsenal decided not to sign Buendia.

Keenos

Yesterday, Arsenal were linked with both Riyad Mahrez and Raheem Sterling.

Despite running away with the Premier League, Pep Guardiola apparently wants to refresh his frontline, with his side scoring their least amount of goals in 5 years and 19 league goals less than last season.

Sergio Aguero is already set to leave, with Harry Kane likely to come in to replace him. But it seems Pepe is also looking at who is behind the front man. In recent days Man City have been linked with a huge deal for Jack Grealish.

With Phil Foden and Bernard Silva, it would mean that one of Mahrez or Sterling would likely have to leave to create the squad space for a new attacked.

So for now, the Arsenal links to both can go in the box of “this is just Man City using Arsenal to let the world know that both men are available”. But we should also have a conversation over whether we should sign either player.

Raham Sterling has had a tough season for Manchester City.

It perhaps shows the heights of his previous seasons that 10 goals and 7 assists is considered a failure, with some going as far as claiming he should not be in the England squad for the Euro’s.

When you look at England’s other wide options, only Marcus Rashford (11 goals, 7 assists) had out performed him.

10 league goals would have made Sterling Arsenal’s 2nd top scorer, and 7 assists our most creative player.

It always has to be remembered with Sterling as well that he is not a dead ball taker. So all of his goals and assists come from open play.

Nicholas Pepe (10 goals, 1 assist) and Bukayo Saka (5 goals, 3 assists) are both a country mile behind Sterling.

Although you do then have to throw in the caveat that Arsenal have been awful this season whilst Sterling plays in a much better team.

What is certain is Arsenal need more creativity, extra options out wide.

As it stands, we only have two proper wide men – Saka and Pepe. The rest are round pegs in square holes.

If anyone thinks playing Sterling on the left would not automatically improve us, they need to give their head a wobble.

Sterling left, Saka or Pepe right. Instant improvement.

Whilst Stelring’s form has dipped, it might be a case of he just needs a new challenge.

You feel with his character, he is at his best when he feels he has something to prove. That then gives his game a little more spike. More agression.

Being “dumped” by Manchester City could re-motivate him. And at 26-years-old he has plenty of years left in the tank.

If Sterling is on the market, Arsenal should make him their primary target.

It perharps show how big perception is in football that whilst Sterling has been criticised, Riyad Mahrez has been labelled as one of Manchester City’s best players this season. This despite him getting less league goals and assists than the Englishman.

I have seen some go as far as comparing Mahrez to Neymar this season. This is surely just an attention seeking exercise, hoping to wind up the Neymar fanboys; rather than a real opinion?

Mahrez is a quality player and was close to joining Arsenal in 2016 from Leicester City.

Leicester blocked the deal and two seasons later he joined Manchester City.

Mahrez has never really been a regular starter for Man City – this seasons 23 league starts the most in his career for them.

Despite his obvious qualities, Arsenal should not pursue Mahrez.

On the right hand side, we already have Pepe and Saka as “inverted” options.

Whilst Mahrez is the level above the pair, he is also 4 years older than Pepe and 11 years older than Saka.

Taking into account Arsenal’s financial restraints this summer, it would not make sense to sign Mahrez for big money when the right hand side is covered.

I am sure if Pepe was playing in the Manchester City side, his statistics would be not too dissimilar to Mahrez; whilst Saka is clearly a star for the present and will only get better.

Mahrez also turns 31 in January, so we would be signing him knowing we might only get another 2 or 3 good seasons out of him. and any future transfer fee would be miniscule.

Instead of signing Mahrez, lets continue with Pepe and Saka.

One finished the season in great form, the other is only going to get better.

So in summary, it is an easy equation.

If it is a choice between sterling and Mahrez, the Englishman is streets ahead.

Sterling has outperformed Mahrez during their time together for City, is 4 years younger and solves our left hand side attacking issue.

Having Sterling, Pepe and Saka gives us more options than Mahrez, Pepe and Saka.

I am sure many will disagree. Enjoy your Bank Holiday weekend. Put the phones down. Go outside. Get some sunshine.

Keenos