Arsenal Exodus Continues As Yaya Sanogo Signs

With the transfer window open less than a week Arsenal have already managed to offload five players from their first team squad. As each player goes there's more space for new players to come in and that's what the fans want and the squad needs. The rumours of possible arrivals continue daily, but Yaya Sanogo is still the only signing to be officially announced.

The 20 year old French man was signed on a long term contract when his contract with Auxerre expired. He's currently starring for France in the under 20 World Cup but his club career has been very limited due to a string of injuries. He's a player who appears to have a lot of talent and he could be a real asset to the club if he can put his injury problems behind him.

The doubters will say he ticks all the usual boxes for an Arsene Wenger signing as he's young, French, free and has had loads of injury problems. Arsenal have had their fair share of injury prone players in recent years and it is a gamble to bring in a player with his record. I'm prepared to sit back and see how he does before knocking his arrival or the manager either.

The latest departure was Vito Mannone who packed his goalkeeping gloves and moved up north to Sunderland. In his eight years at Arsenal he made a few appearances and played quite well in most of them, but never really looked like the answer to Arsenal's goalkeeping problems. I wish him well at his new club except when he comes up against Arsenal of course when I hope he lets in a shed load of goals.

Before Mannone left Johan Djourou was loaned out to Hamburg for the season with an option for them to sign him at the end of the season. Djourou is another player who never quite made it at Arsenal despite playing quite regularly two or three seasons ago. Hopefully things will work out well for him at Hamburg and they will take him for real at the end of the season. 

Before both of those departures the club offloaded Andrey Arshavin, Sebastien Squillaci and Denilson without bringing in any money. The most important things for Arsenal were the space created in the squad for new arrivals and of course the amount of money saved on the wage bill by the five departures. At a guess I would say the club could save up to €250,000 a week by cutting those five players from wage bill. 

That money could well go towards paying the wages of the new arrivals that surely must be just around the corner. The deal for Gonzalo Higuain seems more likely by the day and hopefully it will be announced very soon. I've said it before and I'll say it again - I think he would be a fantastic signing for Arsenal. Not only would he add genuine quality to the team, but his arrival would also show that Arsenal really are trying to compete at the top again.

Nicklas Bendtner is still an Arsenal player though as his proposed move to Eintracht Frankfurt seems to have fallen by the wayside. His departure would save the club a lot of money with his weekly wage supposedly matching his number 52 shirt. There's even a chance Arsenal could bring in a few million quid if Bendtner can find a new club and that could be put to good use elsewhere.

Things have certainly been busy this week even if most of the movement has been out wards. I have no doubt there will be plenty of inward movement before the transfer window closes and I just hope it's all dealt with sooner rather than later. 

That's if for today.

See you tomorrow.