Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger revealed on Friday that he twice missed out on midfielder N’Golo Kante, and Jamie Redknapp isn’t impressed.
Speaking to the media in his pre-match press conference ahead of Saturday’s crunch clash with Chelsea, Wenger conceded that he tried to sign the French international before he moved to Leicester City, and again before he joined Chelsea last summer.
Evidently on both occasions he failed, with Kante going on to play an instrumental role in Leicester’s triumph last season while he looks as though he’s set to make it back-to-back Premier League titles this season at Stamford Bridge.
Coming out publicly and revealing the club’s shortcomings probably wasn’t a great idea in fairness, and Redknapp doesn’t believe Wenger’s done himself any favours.
“Arsene Wenger was asked about Kante on Friday and he said: “we tried to sign him twice”. Well, for me, that’s not good enough,” Redknapp is quoted as saying by the Metro.
“Why did you nearly sign him? Why didn’t you sign him? Arsenal are in the Champions League, if they want to push the boat out they’ve got the money to compete.
“But that’s a terrible indictment of where Arsenal are that they couldn’t bring him in if they wanted to. He would have been the perfect fit for them.”
Redknapp slated the Gunners for the home defeat to Watford in midweek, and believes results like that wouldn’t happen with a player like Kante in their midfield.
Bringing up the money argument is all well and good and an easy way of criticising, but Arsenal did spend and brought in Granit Xhaka in the summer as they evidently had faith in him to do the job needed in midfield for them.
The problem lies in the fact that Kante would have had a bigger and more positive influence on the team overall and so missing out on him twice, if the opportunity was really there, is the real problem and it’s an error that Arsenal could now come to regret.