Arsenal are £20m short on Konsa, and Saliba will not be back for the opener

Arsenal went back to Aston Villa for Ezri Konsa on Thursday and finished the day roughly where they started, about £20 million short of a deal.

Their opening proposal was worth a little over half Villa’s valuation and got nowhere, with Villa co-owner Nassef Sawiris reported to have taken a dim view of it. The Athletic put the state of play at £40 million from Arsenal against £60 million from Villa. Ben Jacobs reported on 13 August that talks had been revived. The gap has not moved.

Seven days and £20 million

The window closes at 11pm UK time on Tuesday 1 September, so on paper there is room. In practice there is much less of it. Arsenal open the Premier League season at home to Coventry City on Friday 21 August at 8pm, and a defender signed after that date is no use for the first game of a title defence.

Villa are expected to turn down an offer at Arsenal’s present level. They have shown no willingness to go below their asking price, and their stated preference has been to keep Konsa and put new terms in front of him rather than sell. Konsa has been on holiday since the World Cup and was due back this week, which at least puts the player in the same country as the conversation.

Arteta is short of half a back four

The urgency is not hard to trace. Speaking after Arsenal’s pre-season meeting with Borussia Dortmund, Mikel Arteta ruled both William Saliba and Jurrien Timber out of the opening fixtures. Timber, working back from a groin problem, is on the pitch again but weeks from selection. Saliba is the bigger worry.

His back trouble goes back to March and worsened at the World Cup, where he limped out of France’s semi-final against Spain. Arsenal announced after the tournament that surgery had been ruled out but that he faced an extended spell of managed recovery. He is a defender who played 50 matches last season as Arsenal ended a 22-year wait for the title, and he will not be on the pitch when they start defending it.

Why Konsa specifically

Konsa covers both absences by himself. Centre-back is his position and right-back is his second one, which is exactly the shape of the hole Saliba and Timber have left. He is 28, has 28 England caps, and spent the summer in Thomas Tuchel’s World Cup squad. He headed in England’s second goal inside 18 minutes of the third-place play-off in Miami, the 6-4 win over France that Saliba sat out.

None of which helps Arsenal at the negotiating table. Konsa is under contract at Villa Park until June 2028. There is no expiring deal to lean on and no pressure point to squeeze, which is how a selling club arrives at £60 million for a 28-year-old and expects to be paid it. What Arsenal have going for them is the player: Konsa is understood to be open to the move, and the Villa dressing room has been bracing for his exit.

The money has to come from somewhere

Arsenal’s route to funding a defender runs through their forward line. Galatasaray have lodged an official bid worth around £38.5 million for Gabriel Martinelli, with Arsenal holding out for closer to €60 million, and the Turkish club have put an offer in for Ethan Nwaneri as well. Arsenal are said to be more receptive on Nwaneri at the numbers currently on the table.

Which suggests the Konsa question is really a sequencing question. Sell first, bid properly second, and hope Villa are still picking up the phone in the last week of August. If nothing goes out, Arteta lines up against Coventry with a patched-together back four and a first-choice target he could not afford.

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