According to reports, Arsenal are ready to let go of their £72million club-record signing after the player has been left out of Mikel Arteta’s plans for next season.
Nicolas Pepe was a big signing for the Gunners back in 2019, costing £72million from Lille. The 27-year-old arrived in North London with so much hype around him, after Arsenal broke their transfer record to beat teams like Bayern Munich to his signature.
Nicolas Pepe came in with so much hope, however that slowly faded away with the lack of quality in his performances and ultimately due to the price tag, he has to go down as a flop signing for Arsenal.
The Ivory Coast international hasn’t started for the Gunners since October 2021.
In his four seasons in North London, Nicolas Pepe scored 27 goals and notched up 21 assists in 112 appearances for Arsenal. It’s not a bad return at all, especially when you factor in the struggling Arsenal side he was apart of, however he unfortunately never reached the heights expected of him & was loaned back to France at the beginning of this season.
Nicolas Pepe signing for Arsenal in 2019. [Image Credit: Getty Images]
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The emergence of Bukayo Saka also took Arsenal’s record signing out of the first-team picture, with the 21-year-old coming into the team & being Mikel Arteta’s first name on the team sheet shortly after.
According to The Sun, Arsenal are ready to part ways with Nicolas Pepe come the summer transfer window, as well as six other fringe players in order to trim down the squad and bring in better quality in depth ahead of the club’s return to Champions League football next season.
The big issue is the £140,000 weekly salary the Ivorian winger currently holds at Arsenal. If no club wants to pay that sort of money for Nicolas Pepe then Arsenal might have to think about paying off the rest of the player’s salary in order to get him off the books, which would cost the Gunners around £7million. Similarly to what they done with former-club captain, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.
As per The Sun…
“If Pepe joins them on the scrapheap, that will be £340m-worth of signings allowed to depart for nothing.”
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