Football journalist Dean Jones has been sharing his thoughts on the possibility of Arsenal potentially completing a deal that would see Arsenal striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang move to Barcelona, with Philippe Coutinho joining the north London club.
This comes after Jones made an appearance on a recent edition of Touchline Talk where he spoke about a range of transfer-related topics.
After it was recently reported that the previously mentioned deal between Arsenal and Barcelona involving Aubameyang and Coutinho could take place this summer, Jones had this to say on the matter.
He said: “It’s not going to happen; I just don’t see it.
“I’d be very surprised anyway, not because Arsenal are desperate to keep [Aubameyang] – just because I think this late in the window, that’s really complicated, and Barcelona have their own issues right now that they’ve been dealing with.
“So, I’d be very surprised if that materialised in this window.”
Arsenal signed Aubameyang back in the 2018 January transfer window from German club Borussia Dortmund for a fee of £57.38 million.
Since then, the 32-year-old, who is currently valued at £22.5 million, has made 148 appearances for the Gunners across all competitions in which he has managed to score 85 goals and provide 19 assists along the way (per Transfermarkt) – but only scored 10 goals in the Premier League last season.
TIF Thoughts on Dean Jones’ comments on a potential swap deal including Aubameyang and Coutinho…
Despite what Jones had to say about Arsenal not necessarily being desperate to keep Aubameyang this summer, we feel that the club would want to keep hold of their captain based on how important he has been for the club in terms of his goalscoring output since his arrival at the Emirates Stadium.
Would you like to see Arsenal swap Aubameyang for Coutinho?
Yes
No
In terms of Coutinho, while he does have some experience of playing in the Premier League under his belt with Liverpool before he made his mega-money move to Barcelona, perhaps Arsenal wouldn’t necessarily need to add the Brazilian attacking midfielder to their squad after they have reportedly agreed a deal to sign Martin Odegaard from Real Madrid.
In other news: Ornstein reveals AFC star has pushed ‘a number of proposals’ to force exit