Arsenal May Have To Gun For Someone Else With Belgian Midfielder Chase Uncertain

Youri Tielemans of Leicester City in action with Bernardo Silva and Ilkay Gundogan of Manchester City — Youri Tielemans of Leicester City may not get his wish to move to north London in the next transfer window. Getty Images | Marc Atkins

KEY POINTS

Arsenal expected to make another go at Youri Tielemans in January
The Gunners need to expand their options and target other players
Tielemans is seen as a good midfield addition

Arsenal will have to broaden its options with the January transfer window nearing.

Although the Gunners were linked to Youri Tielemans, journalist Dean Jones cautioned that due to recent developments, Mikel Arteta may have to target other players they can bring to the Emirates Stadium in the January transfer window.

"Maybe some of it is around the fee, maybe it's to do with Leicester not wanting to sell there and then," Jones said. "Also it's to do with the fact that Arsenal have got their feelers out and are looking at other players right now, so I still think the Tielemans situation is quite uncertain."

It will be recalled that the Gunners attempted to acquire the 25-year-old footballer in the last summer transfer window.

However, the thing standing at that time was the £25 million ($30.83 million) fee that Leicester City was asking. Hence, negotiations bogged down.

Although Tielemans was interested in moving to North London with the chance to play in the UEFA Champions League, there is no telling if Arsenal is ready to meet the asking price of the Foxes.

Hence, it may be in the best interest of Arteta and the Gunners to look at other options.

Among the names now being linked to Arsenal include Hakan Calhanoglu. However, the asking fee for the Turkish midfielder is also hefty, roughly around £26 million ($32 million) which is somewhat close to what Leicester City was asking for TIelemans.

Aside from Calhanoglu, other names that Arteta and the Gunners may want to consider include Danilo, Sergej Milinkovic-Savic and Ruben Neves.

But even if they do broaden their choices, Tielemans remains someone who makes sense for the Gunners.

Although he features for only 30 minutes for Belgium in their defeat to Morocco, 0-2, he demonstrated good passing range by completing one long ball.

But overall, it was his defensive efforts that were laudable.

Hence, Tielemans appears to be a fit addition to Arsenal's midfield and someone who could give other players such as Thomas Partey and Granit Xhaka some friendly competition in the latter stages of the season.