Arsenal are suddenly being linked with Wolves winger Adama Traore over the past couple of days – according to a report in The Mirror.
Wolves paid £18m in 2018 for the player’s services and right now he is one of Santo’s biggest assets at the Molineux. This season, Traore has scored four and assisted seven goals in 28 Premier League games and his influence in games is expected to grow over the next couple of seasons.
But this maturity might not be with Wolves with his agent claiming that the player could be heading for the exit doors in the summer.
He told EFE: “I can’t talk about contractual situations because it’s a private matter, but Adama was having a good season, and with his age, conditions and the fact he’s a very appealing player, there would have been a market for him, no doubt about it.
“We have to hope for the situation to normalise itself and hope that it won’t affect him this summer”.
Why Arsenal do not need Adama Traore:
Adama Traore plays on the right-wing meaning he will be in direct competition with Nicolas Pepe if Mikel Arteta was to sign him in the summer.
And this is the last thing the manager would want to do given the Gunners paid a lot of money for the Lille man last year and his best in England is yet to come.
Pepe has been really underwhelming in his first season in the Premier League but recently Arteta admitted that he is making progress both on and off the pitch.
“I’ll show him footage of what we want and on the training ground I will make him defend in situations where he is full-back and I am the winger,” said the Gunners boss last month.
“You have to feel the moment when the ball is here where you are weak and depending on the step that you take, how that effects the opponent every time, where the spaces are for the strikers, where the strikers want the ball in certain areas, it’s a process.
“It’s part of his development. He needs to open more doors to be more unpredictable for the opponent and give more options as well offensively to us.
“He’s working on it, he will improve, he will get better. He’s got the talent, an immense quality and he’s willing to do it.”
Arsenal paid €80 million for the services of the Ivorian so there’s no way the manager can just push him to the substitute’s bench next season or sell him off for that matter.
So if Adama Traore was to move to Arsenal, he will have to fight for a place in the first XI which he certainly wouldn’t want to do at this stage of his career.
Also, Wolves currently value Traore at around £70 million so it would make absolutely no sense for the North London club to spend so much money on two players who do the exact same job.
