With less than one month left for the summer transfer window to shut down, Arsenal are believed to be interested in beefing up their armoury further. Under the tutelage of Unai Emery, the North London based outfit have already signed Lucas Torreira, Bernd Leno, Matteo Guendouzi, Sokratis and Stephan Lichtsteiner. But the former Paris Saint-Germain boss is keen to make some more additions.
As per one of the latest reports by Gazzetta Dello Sport, Emery has put Juventus midfielder Rodrigo Bentancur on his radar. He is an international teammate of Torreira as both of them represent Uruguay on the international stage. Apparently, the new Arsenal head coach is desirous to utilize them together at club level football and Bentancur’s calibre is hardly unknown to anyone of the football fraternity.
The Gunners have been heavily linked with Barcelona and Portugal midfielder Andre Gomes. Gomes is reportedly available for £18million but Mundo Deportivo have reported lately that the player is keen to move to the ranks of Tottenham Hotspur. This has been the main reason for the rise of Arsenal’s interest to sign Bentancur to strengthen their midfield further.
Bentancur surfaced through the youth ranks of Boca Juniors and his dazzling displays for their senior side prompted Juventus to make him sign on the dotted line in the summer of 2017. However, the 21-year-old hasn’t been able to cement a place in the starting line-up of the Serie A giants. He has been used as a fringe player and he managed to bag just 5 league starts for Juventus last season.
With the arrival of Emre Can from Liverpool, the starlet is set to face immense competition for getting game time in the 2018-19 season if he stays with Juventus. Although his club level football has a lot of scope for improvement, he impressed for his national side in the World Cup, starting all of the games as they reached the quarter-finals only to be knocked out by France, who eventually won the Cup for their second time beating Croatia.
Bentancur needs to play regularly to ensure that his trajectory of development sees an ascendancy in the coming seasons. He forged an excellent partnership with Torreira while playing for Uruguay in the World Cup and it will be interesting to see if the deal crosses the line. However, Emery already has some really good midfielders in his camp and the Uruguayan is likely to face similar competition if he moves to the Emirates Stadium.
