Reports: Arsenal ‘Last Ditch’ Loan Deal For Ousmane Dembele Somewhat Thwarted By French Winger Publicly Committing To Barcelona

Chris Wright

9th, August 2018

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It’s deadline day, so take it with a pinch of salt, but reports are percolating this morning that Arsenal are plotting one last attempt to sign Ousmane Dembele from Barcelona before the window shuts.

The yarn seems to have been stoked by a photo shared on Instagram last week that saw Dembele fraternising with several Arsenal players (including Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Alexandre Lacazette and Henrikh Mkhitaryan) at a children’s garden party in London.

Having snowballed since then, Mundo Deportivo are now claiming that Unai Emery is a “huge fan” of Dembele and as such is ready to submit a £10million offer to Barca to take the French forward on a season-long loan with a £90million permanent deal in the pipeline thereafter.

However, it would appear that Dembele himself, who only signed for Barca for €105million last August, has tipped a mopping bucket of icy water all over proceedings by expressing his intent to remain at the Camp Nou.

While taking part in a live Twitch broadcast by Football Manager Guru on Wednesday night, the 21-year-old was asked by a fan if he was aware of Arsenal’s supposed interest.

“I’m staying at Barca, I’m ready to play the Super Cup,” came the sober reply, directly from the horse’s mouth (quote via MARCA).

Well, that’s that then.

Pies are entirely confident that’s the last we’ll be hearing of that particular non-story today…