Alvaro Morata has been linked with a move away from the Spanish capital since the end of the season and Real Madrid will look to sell the young Spanish striker for the right price. Arsenal and Juventus were the clear favourites to sign the striker but the Real Madrid president Florentino Perez had this to say about Morata moving to Juventus “I am friends with the Juventus executives and President Andrea Agnelli. But I have not spoken to them regarding Morata and, honestly, the possibilities that he goes to play in Turin are zero”. So it seems like Arsenal are clear favourites but I will be telling you why we should not be looking to sign the young striker.
Morata may be a very talented striker with a lot of potential, but do we really want to be spending millions of pounds on a 21-year-old that hasn’t proven himself yet on the big stage? The metro reported earlier in the week that Arsenal would have to spend £25 million to bring the Spanish striker to the Emirates. This would mean that we probably wouldn’t look to sign another striker if we splash big money on the youngster, so we would be left with Giroud and two young strikers in Sanogo and Morata, which in my opinion wouldn’t win us the league and would fall well short of the other premier league partnerships, for example, Luis Suarez and Daniel Sturridge. Morata has only managed to play for the Spanish under 21’s team 12 times and has made 37 appearances for Real Madrid in 3 years and had only 3 starts in La Liga last season, so he is very inexperienced and I really don’t think you can challenge for the premier league and champions league with a 21-year-old leading the line up front.
There have been strong reports coming out of Spain suggesting that if Real Madrid do sell Alvaro Morata, he will have a clause in his contract that will allow the Spanish giants to buy back the striker. This is one reason why I really can’t see Arsenal signing the striker as Arsenal and Wenger has never been a fan of clauses in contracts and especially buy back clauses, but also because if the striker is successful at the club and proves himself at the top-level then we wouldn’t want to get rid of him and the buyback clause will allow Real Madrid to sign him again. So it would seem like we had breaded the young Spanish striker into becoming a world class talent and supply a future rival, which is what we have done in the last 5 years by selling our top players to top rivals, which has to stop.
Finally, with the formation that we have been playing for a number of years now, I cannot see how Alvaro Morata would fit into the side, unless he is a rotational figure at the club but if you are willing to spend £25 million on a player then surely he has to start and play consistently throughout the season. Although he was criticized throughout the season, I was impressed with Oliver Giroud and I don’t think he actually needs replacing. I just think he needs back up as we lack depth in the forward positions. Supplying back up for your striker shouldn’t cost £25 million and I believe you could add a striker who has already proved himself in the premier league for less than £10 million in Loic Remy.
So overall, I think signing Alvaro Morata would be a massive risk and in my opinion has more negatives than positives. I think Morata needs more first team football to be able to have the £25 million price tag that Real Madrid have apparently set.