Arsenal bid £8m for Villa(Times) but Man City want Barca striker to replace Balotelli (Mirror)
Tuesday, January 29th, 2013
David Villa to Arsenal, or another big club in England is the transfer story that just won’t go away!
Despite the fact that Arsene Wenger said in his pre-match press conference ahead of the Liverpool game that “Barcelona don’t want to sell David Villa and have made it clear,” the Spanish striker still features heavily in the back pages on Wednesday.
The Times get the ball rolling with the claim that ”Arsenal have tested the resolve of Barcelona by lodging a bid of about £8 million for David Villa.”
Gary Jacob and Tony Barrett in The Times point to an Arsene Wenger quote from the same press conference, where the Arsenal boss said:”We could do with top quality, one more, but you have to, find him.”
Leaving aside the fact that 8 million pounds is woefully short for a top striker, who Barcelona seem to want to keep, Arsenal look to have challengers for the signature of David Villa.
The back of the Daily Mirror on Wednesday leads with the headline: “Bye Bye Mario, Buy Buy Villa!” Suggesting Manchester City will launch their own bid for David Villa.
It seems most likely that DavidVilla will stay at Barcelona until the summer, expect plenty of transfer gossip between now and the end of the January transfer window though.