by Lewis Ambrose

Once again Bild are reporting that Arsenal are interested in the services of Sven Bender of Borussia Dortmund.

New Dortmund head coach Thomas Tuchel already has an abundance of midfielders to choose from, but that doesn’t increase the likelihood of any deal for Bender this summer.

Recurrent

This rumour is one that comes around every summer with people saying Arsenal need a ‘hard’ midfielder who wins tackles and Sven Bender being a midfielder that wins a lot of tackles.

There hasn’t really been anything in it in the past, and it is unlikely there will be this time around either.

 

Bender arguably isn’t as integral as he has been in the past at Dortmund but it remains to be seen how Tuchel views him, with the new head coach saying he wants to judge all of his players in training before he decides anything.

Despite already signing youngster Julian Weigl and more experienced midfielder Gonzalo Castro from 1860 Munich and Bayer Leverkusen respectively Dortmund still want to keep hold of Bender, whether or not Ilkay Gündogan is sold.

On Saturday sporting director Michael Zorc told Sky Sport that any deal for Bender simply wasn’t happening:

“Any speculation about Sokratis and Bender is completely irrelevant, we plan with both.”

Dortmund’s intentions are clear, Bender going somewhere is incredibly unlikely.

Arsenal would be much better served chasing Gündogan but, with no firm offers on the table for the midfielder, it is still possible that he’ll sign some sort of extension if nobody acts quickly.