According to the Sun, Arsenal are ready to offload Egyptian midfielder Mohamed Elneny in January for a fee of £15 million and Leicester City are prepared to make a move for the 26-year-old.
Elneny, who was signed by the Gunners back in January 2016, enjoyed significant playtime under former manager Arsene Wenger but the Egyptian has been frozen out of the first-team scheme of things by Unai Emery.
As a matter of fact, his involvement in the playing eleven has been limited to the Europa League only where he has made 3 appearances but he is yet to make a single appearance in the Premier League this season.
Quite clearly, Emery hasn’t taken the Egyptian into consideration for a starting role in the Premier League and Arsenal want to offload him in January to fund a move for Villarreal’s £17.8 million-rated midfielder Pablo Fornals.
Elneny, who was a part of the Egyptian squad at the World Cup in Russia, was a regular for Arsenal in the Europa League last season where he made as many as 12 appearances, nine of which were starts. The 26-year-old excelled for the Gunners in the heart of the midfield with his flawless passing, distribution and tenacity and also made a total of 11 starts in the Premier League last season.
In fact, Elneny averaged 65.8 passes per game with an accuracy percentage of 93.5 in the Europa League last season, which also included 4.8 successful long balls per ninety minutes. Furthermore, he averaged 0.9 tackles, 1.3 interceptions and 1.2 clearances per game in the Europa League, which clearly shows that he is good enough to fit into any of the mid-table teams in the Premier League.
To put things into perspective, Bournemouth must table a bid and try to beat Leicester City to sign the Egyptian defensive midfielder. The Cherries have surpassed all expectation this season with a wonderful start to their Premier League campaign. Having racked up wins on a consistent basis, Eddie Howe’s men sit 6th in the standings with 20 points from 12 games.
As things stand, Bournemouth have a realistic chance of replicating Burnley’s last term in the Premier League which saw the Clarets finish in a Europa League playoff spot. However, there is still a long way to go in the season and Eddie Howe’s men will have to maintain their consistency levels if they are to fight toe to toe with the likes of Everton, Watford, Wolves and Manchester United for a spot in Europe next season.
And bringing in players with European experience to the club should be the way forward for manager Eddie Howe. Moreover, Bournemouth need to strengthen their resources in central midfield. Jefferson Lerma has been a revelation since joining the Cherries in the summer for a club-record fee but Lewis Cook,21, is still young and needs time to work on his game.
Dan Gosling is a good box-to-box midfielder and South Africa born Andrew Surman is a handy option to have on the bench but neither of them is quite capable of taking the team to greater heights.
To be honest, Bournemouth would be a much more formidable outfit if they can manage to team up Elneny with Lerma in the heart of the midfield.
Hence, a January swoop for Elneny would definitely help the Cherries to edge ahead of their rivals Leicester City in the race for the Europa League spot next season.