Arteta comments on Odegaard speculation, says Arsenal are in ‘process’ of signing players

Martin Macdonald

• Updated: 19 May 2021 15:43 BST
• 2 min read

Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta says the club have started the “process” of bringing in players in the January transfer window, having successfully offloaded some of the members of their squad.

Within the last week, Mesut Ozil has left for Fenerbahce after his contract was mutually terminated, while Sokratis Papastathopoulos has also left the club on a free.

Sead Kolasinac and William Saliba have joined Schalke and Nice on loan.

With space in the squad now opening up, Arteta has revealed that Arsenal are now working to bring in new recruits.

“We are in that process right now,” he said.

“We have done the first part, more or less, and we are focusing now on the second phase. Obviously, this market and the context makes it difficult, but we are looking at options and we will see what we can do.”

One of the players Arsenal have been linked with in the winter window is Real Madrid’s Martin Odegaard, who is keen to leave the Santiago Bernabeu on loan after finding minutes hard to come by in 2020/21 under Zinedine Zidane.

Arteta, however, refused to comment on the speculation surrounding the talented Norwegian.

“I cannot comment about players that play for other clubs,” he responded when asked about Odegaard in a press conference on Thursday.

“We are looking at various positions because the movement we have made in this window with some players leaving the club has left us a little bit short in certain areas.

“So if we can, we will do it and if we can’t, we will keep going with what we have.”

After enduring a dire start to the campaign, Arsenal are now in their best run of form of the season, having won four out of their last five games in the Premier League.

They have a mountain to climb to qualify for Europe, though, as they remain in 10th in the table.