Arsenal have made major progress on the Declan Rice transfer, but Fabrizio Romano has explained why it’s not quite ‘here we go’ on the deal yet, even if it’s surely only a matter of time now.
The Gunners look to have done the majority of the work now to see off competition from Manchester City for Rice, though Romano has written in his exclusive CaughtOffside column that Manchester United were never really in the race, despite what others had reported.
Rice looks a hugely exciting signing for Arsenal, and there’s no doubt he could also have had a huge impact at Old Trafford as an upgrade on the likes of Scott McTominay and Fred.
Still, Romano praised the great work done by Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta and director Edu, explaining just how crucial they were in making this deal work when City joined the race and posed the biggest threat to the deal.
“Wednesday ended up being the day of Declan Rice to Arsenal. During the night, an agreement was reached between Arsenal and West Ham, all parties are very relaxed – the two clubs and the player. It’s a historic deal for English football as Rice will become the country’s most expensive player ever for £100m plus £5m in add-ons,” Romano said.
“It’s not quite ‘here we go’ yet, but it’s probably only a matter of hours. The only thing to be sorted is the payment terms – West Ham want £100m guaranteed in 18 months, so it’s about this detail and then it will be done. A medical has not yet been scheduled, but Arsenal have done a great job here and it shouldn’t be much longer before it’s all wrapped up.
“Mikel Arteta and Edu deserve immense credit for the work they’ve done here, dating back to January. And in the crucial hours when Manchester City submitted their bid for Rice, probably the most difficult and intense hours of the negotiations, Arteta remained convinced about having Rice as Arsenal’s star player – he kept pushing on the player side, convincing him about the project and how it’s perfect for Rice to become a crucial part of it.
“One final point, despite what some outlets have saying about Manchester United trying to enter the race, and offering players and so on, I’ve personally never reported Man Utd in the Rice story because I’ve honestly always been told they were never into this deal.
“It was Arsenal, strongly Arsenal and then Man City came in late on before officially leaving the race yesterday.”
The question is whether it was really ever Man City?
Supposedly they had made clear they would not bid unless given indication from the Rice camp he was open to a move up there – bid came in on Tuesday, but by Wednesday they had obviously heard different to the day before.
One club was stitched up, City – Rice was never really interested -, Arsenal – paid an extra £15m -, West Ham – rubbed hands with glee over a bidding war.
One of the biggest laughs over this must be the pundits who claimed Rice had to go to City to be sure of being an annual PL winner – yet in the same breath many of them had said Declan would take Arsenal up a level, finished 2nd last season, so only one level he can help them rise by!!
18 months? Isn’t that quite short of a time to pay such amount? If my memory serves me right, Mudryk, Enzo, Nunez and many other transfer fees that are even lower than Rice’s weren’t agreed to be paid at such a short time frame. It beats me why West Ham would want the payment made in 18 months.