Arsenal: Corentin Tolisso deal reflects poorly on Alexandre Lacazette

Arsenal has watched one of their Lyon targets, Corentin Tolisso, land a deal with Bayern Munich, which does not make their endless pursuit of Alexandre Lacazette look good.

Arsenal seem to be inching closer and closer to Alexandre Lacazette by the day. It’s been a three year journey that still has no end in sight. Lyon owner Jean-Michael Aulas has lived up to his reputation of being a tough guy to buy from and there is nothing wrong with that. He wants to get the most out of his players.

Arsene Wenger has been dealing with that for the past three years, trying unsuccessfully year after year to land the crown-jewel of Lyon, Lacazette.

According to numerous reports, talks are being held in London over the sale of Lacazette, at long, long last. Granted, that doesn’t mean that a deal is inevitable, but it is a more positive sign than what we have heard in the past.

That being said, seeing Corentin Tolisso land at Bayern Munich so easily reflects incredibly poorly on Arsenal’s endless pursuit of Lacazette. Tolisso was another jewel of Lyon, a truly talented player that every team out there should have had an expressed interest in. You can bet that Aulas wanted to ensure that he got everything he wanted for the midfielder and Bayern gave him just that.

The price tag was said to be £35m, Bayern paid it, Bayern got it. And it’s still two weeks until the transfer window opens.

Meanwhile, Wenger and Aulas have been haggling over Lacazette’s price for the past three years.

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I always think back to when the Emirates was being built. The logic behind it was that it would allow the Gunners to compete financially with teams like Bayern Munich, yet here were are, years later, and Bayern are making transfers look as simple as buying a pack of bubblegum and Arsenal still look like they are trying to adopt a child every time they get into transfer talks.

It’s frustrating to see the same trends happening year after year. I am still not confident in Wenger’s ability to strike a deal for Lacazette because Wenger woulds sooner chop off a leg than pay market value for a player.

I don’t mean to gripe. There has been a lot of negativity lately, but that’s because I am seeing guys like Serge Gnabry and Tolisso go to Bayern and we can’t even lock down the players that we do have. No new contracts have been signed. I can’t help but think of Jabari’s piece yesterday about how we just need to be decisive for once.

Next: Arsenal's Potential Starting XI Under Diego Simeone

Every so often you see an amazing display of decisiveness from Wenger. We saw it with Granit Xhaka and now with Sead Kolasinac. But why can’t it always be like that?

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