Arsenal urged to sign €85m star INSTEAD of Toney and Osimhen

Robin Bairner

• 28 Feb 2024 06:44 GMT
• 3 min read

Arsenal have been told to forget Ivan Toney and Victor Osimhen ahead of the summer transfer window because there is an option out there that is even better than the Brentford and Napoli strikers.

Signing a modern No.9 will be a priority for Mikel Arteta’s side during the off-season, with concerns that they lack goals from that position.

Given Arsenal have scored 25 goals in their last six Premier League matches, this idea that they are short of firepower seems a little ridiculous, yet they also failed to register a shot on target as they lost 1-0 to Porto in the Champions League last week.

Toney and Osimhen are the two names most readily associated with a move to the Emirates, yet Dusan Vlahovic is another who Arteta is a big fan of – and the Serbia international is the player he has been urged to sign by former US international and ESPN pundit Janusz Michallik.

He believes that Vlahovic would be an even better signing than the other two.

“Here’s a team, how many goals have they scored? 25-26 in six games in the Premier League. But they didn’t score in Porto. Maybe it was a one-off. But maybe that one player is missing when Saka and Martinelli are off,” Michalik said.

“That central forward, given the amount of goals they score, you could say is not needed. But, I don’t know, Dusan Vlahovic, to me, fits in that team before maybe Ivan Toney and Osimhen. Some of it is money and some of it is age in those. But I like what I see there. Left-footed player that would fit nicely there.”

Arsenal still want Vlahovic

Arsenal were beaten to the striker by Juventus in January 2022, when the Serie A giants completed an €83.5 million move, but they continue to be interested in him.

FootballTransfers exclusively revealed prior to the January transfer window that Vlahovic was the striker that Arteta had his eyes on.

Ultimately, Arsenal did not make a single transfer during January, but if the Spaniard had his way, it would have been the 24-year-old he moved for.