Arsenal’s hopes of signing Julian Draxler this month have gone up in smoke after Schalke told the Gunners where to get off. The Daily Mail reports that the Premier League leaders tabled a package worth £35m but the Bundesliga club have knocked it back, despite the fact the offer comprised £20m in cash plus the Gunners’ unsettled frontman Lukas Podolski.
“It is nonsense to suggest we might consider selling him this winter,” a Schalke official is quoted in the Mail, adding: “It will not happen.”
Despite the setback, Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger hasn’t given up entirely on getting his hands on the 20-year-old Draxler and another attempt to lure him to England will be made in the summer, when a £37m release clause in his contract kicks in.
Written by Steve Milne