Premier League runner-up Arsenal remains a club of interest for fans and neutrals alike this summer as Mikel Arteta and Edu Gaspar once again look to retool the Gunners’ first team to mount another challenge both at home and abroad in 2023-24, but questions surrounding two of the club’s central strikers remain a key part of much of the discourse surrounding the summer window.
Hale End Academy graduate pair Folarin Balogun and Eddie Nketiah are two names constantly circulating the Arsenal space this summer due to the uncertainty surrounding their futures in north London on the back of how Arteta and Edu intend to institute the next stage of their plans across a process that nearly took the club to the Premier League promised land in 2022-23.
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Arsenal could sell Folarin Balogun for £30-35m this summer. Crystal Palace could be one to watch.
Eddie Nketiah is likely to stay after signing a long term contract a year ago.
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Despite his fantastic season on loan in Ligue 1 at Stade de Reims, it is widely expected that Balogun will be moved on from the Emirates on the back of his own desires to be viewed – and rightly so – as a first-choice option at club level after bagging 21 goals in France last season and in the wake of switching international allegiances to now represent the United States as their leading front man.
CBS Sports’ Ben Jacobs’ update on the Balogun situation specifically named Crystal Palace as a real destination for the American striker in a move that could see him link up with the likes of Eberechi Eze and Michael Olise at Selhurst Park, offering him the chance to lead the line for a side in the top flight of English football.
Balogun’s departure is not expected to go down well with much of the Arsenal fanbase after many feel he has earned a real chance to fight for a place in the senior setup under Arteta, but his own personal needs are likely to supersede the desire of the fans.
As for Nketiah, a player who many would rather the club move away from and jettison via the summer market, Jacobs predicts that the former England youth star will remain at Arsenal as the number two striker behind Gabriel Jesus for, at least, the upcoming 2023-24 campaign in the wake of his new contract that he signed just last year.
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