Arsenal chief spells out January transfer plans after ‘aggressive’ summer spree

January plans: Vinai Venkatesham says Arsenal are very excited about their summer signings
Arsenal FC via Getty Images
Simon Collings @sr_collings24 September 2019

Arsenal managing director Vinai Venkatesham says the club are unlikely to be active in the January transfer window after their recruitment drive this summer.

The Gunners spent big in the most recent transfer window and splashed around £130m on new signings, including a club-record deal of £72m for forward Nicolas Pepe.

And in the wake of that summer spend Venkatesham has told supporters they should not expect too much activity in January unless the club is forced to dip into the market.

“We’ve just been through the transfer period in the summer, that’s what we always call the main transfer window,” Venkatesham told Bloomberg.

“And we were very aggressive in that transfer window, signing a number of new players that we are very excited about - predominately targeting young players that we believe can grow and develop with us over future years.

“When we look forward to January, we’ll see when January comes. I’d say that we always treat the summer window as being the more strategic window.

“And the January window is the one where you need to be a bit more tactical, maybe responding to an injury or another demand. But really our work is done in the summer - and we’re really pleased with what we did in the summer.

“We’ve been really focused over the summer. We made some defensive reinforcements, signing David Luiz from Chelsea and Kieran Tierney from Celtic. We’re looking forward to seeing how those players progress and how they do over the course of the season.”

Arsenal are back in action tonight against Nottingham Forest in the Carabao Cup and head coach Unai Emery will be hoping to give a number of returning players minutes.

Arsenal squad 2019-20 | Injuries, contracts and squad numbers

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Centre-back Rob Holding is in contention to start, while full-backs Hector Bellerin and Kieran Tierney are both hoping to feature at some point too.

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