Except Guehi is in exactly the same position so unless Levy is also negotiating for Liverpool I think it is clear that Palace had a red line.
Also a good point. Maybe if it had been wrapped up earlier they would have sold him and got their replacement in to play the qualifier.
Not sure he is as there isn’t any active bids for him. Just interest. Liverpool have been prioritising the Isak deal too. We’ve been negotiating with Palace for weeks over Eze and made it clear he was our primary target. One injury to an Arsenal player and they get it done in 5 hours.
It's much easier once someone else has negotiated the fee and the player wants your club. I will be proved wrong if Eze doesn't play tomorrow. If he does then Arsenal have bought him on the exact day that we could have.
Except it’s not the exact day, the exact day for us could’ve been anything over the last 2-3 weeks. You cannot seriously believe that in the weeks of negotiations the sticky point has been Eze has to play the first conference game for Palace, that can easily scupper any deal if he picks up a bad injury. It’s almost certainly more logical to believe that as time has gone by, Palace have eventually said that they’ll play him tomorrow because the deal’s dragged for longer than expected.
I’m not convinced spurs are at fault here. However, maybe the club could have simply gone straight in a few weeks ago and met the release clause that expired last week. But I suspect Palace were dragging things along in the hope that either would allow Eze to play tomorrow and/or allow another club to bid a higher amount.
You guys have proper cocked this up aint yer, jeez lads. Now I'm going to have to pop to Spurly's hairdresser to avoid Piskie's gloating on the Prem board.
I might steer clear of the War Thread for a bit. Ponkie's going to be unbearable after this. Saf and Windy will have to hold down the fort in my absence. And someone needs to make sure Sucky goes to bed before 10pm. Bins need putting out on Friday. Cheers.
No chance that arsenal were in for eze until this injury to havertz. If they were it would be negligent of them to not have him in the team integrated and ready for the season especially if he has a release clause
It's common knowledge, widely reported, that they spoke to Eze before us in this window, but were not gonna strike because they needed to offload players first apparently. Havertz being opens a position in their squad, much like I doubt we would have been in if both Kulu and Maddison weren't inured.
The fact is, if you're an Arsenal fan, they will always be above us in the pecking order. It's no surprise. Last big move back to his boyhood club. Plus, he was in the youth squad. The time to get Eze would have been way back when he was at QPR or even before. It would have been the stuff of dreams for it to happen now. The upside now is that Levy and the scouts have to show some intent and competence and make some solid purchases in that area. Maybe even two younger options. Simmons ain't coming, he wants Chelsea apparently. This Paz fella looks good, but he's very young and maybe a risk, him with a more experienced option may be the thing. I also doubt he'd come either, especially with Fabregas no doubt spitting anti-Spurs poison in his ear. The NLDs are going to be extra spicy. I hope that we meet them in the CL too, with a well stocked squad of course. The only option we have to silence the noise is beating them in these matches. The stakes just got much higher. With Frank at the helm we have a chance, but we may need more weaponry. It's a reality check too. It'll take more than one EL cup to become more attractive than certain other teams to most players.
Actually worse: as per Miguel Delaney, they had an agreement with Palace in place since August 10th, aka three weeks ago Have to say Romano, Ornstein et al kept that quiet
