Lille's Ivorian forward Nicolas Pepe celebrates after scoring a goal during the French L1 football match between Lille (LOSC) and Olympique Lyonnais (OL) on December 1, 2018 at the Pierre Mauroy Stadium in Villenueve d'Ascq. (Photo by FRANCOIS LO PRESTI/AFP/Getty Images)

Arsenal Gossip

Arsenal bid €80m for Pepe despite only having £40m to spend

Jul 13, 2019

According to Telefoot Arsenal have just submitted an €80m bid for Nicolas Pepe but unless they’ve offered to pay Lille €1m-a-year for 80 years I’m not sure how that’s possible.

Lille's Ivorian forward Nicolas Pepe celebrates after scoring a goal during the French Cup round of 16 football match between Rennes and Lille on February 6, 2019 at the Roazhon Park in Rennes, northwestern France. (Photo by JEAN-FRANCOIS MONIER / AFP) — Lille’s Ivorian forward Nicolas Pepe celebrates after scoring a goal during the French Cup round of 16 football match between Rennes and Lille on February 6, 2019 at the Roazhon Park in Rennes, northwestern France. (Photo by JEAN-FRANCOIS MONIER / AFP)

All summer we’ve been told Arsenal only have £40m or so to spend yet here we are bidding double that for one player despite also needing to reinforce across the team.

Telefoot’s exclusive also repeats the claim that the player is holding out for a move to PSG so this could well be his agent trying to gee that along.

If it is, he’s a bit of an idiot.

Of course, there is always the possibility that we’ve been fed a load of horsesh*t about how much Arsenal have to spend and we have actually bid €80m for one single player.

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Seems unlikely though, huh?

Besides…

Sources tell @BBCSport Arsenal have not submitted a bid for Lille forward Nicolas Pepe and do not have the level of money being reported (€80m) to sign the Ivory Coast international this summer #LOSC #AFC

— David Ornstein (@bbcsport_david) July 13, 2019