Arsenal are believe to have opened talks with Morgan Schneiderlin over a move to the Emirates, after a move for Khedira slowed down due to wage demands. Schneiderlin will be cheaper in terms of transfer fee and would demand much lower wages. The story is being run all over English media today, after Goal.com reported it as an ‘exclusive’. We’ll wait and see.
In a minor addition to this story, the French midfielder followed and then unfollowed Spurs on Twitter yesterday, fuelling rumours that he is actually set for a reunion with his former manager at Tottenham.
Morgan Schneiderlin has been at Southampton since 2008 and has played in most of the English divisions, going through league one, Championship and now playing in the biggest league in the world. However he is certainly not playing for one of the biggest clubs currently, well not anymore they are not. Southampton managed to sign the Frenchmen from Strasbourg for an estimated £1.2 million but without a doubt his value would have risen throughout his career and especially with his impressive performances for Southampton in the premier league, guiding them to an impressive 8th place finish in only their second season back in the big time.
Morgan Schneiderlin is a very experienced player and has featured for his country at nearly every level and has been selected for the France squad in the 2014 world cup. He has made over 200 appearances for Southampton, scoring just 10 goals. The 24 year old may look to follow his former team mates away from St Marys and there is many premier league clubs and clubs from abroad looking at the holding midfielder.
People may say that Arsenal could do a lot better than signing a Southampton player to play a crucial role in the team, however the defensive midfielder role can be very different in England as it is a lot physical and I think that with Schneiderlin having played in the premier league for 2 seasons now he has experience the league and could be more effective than signing a defensive midfielder from abroad. Liverpool back in 2009, signed Alberto Aquilaini from Roma, for a fee of £17 million. However the Italian didn’t live up to his price tag and only made 18 appearances for the Merseyside club. That is an example of a club looking abroad for a holding midfielder and it not paying off.