Arsenal is willing to recruit Barcelona French midfielder De Jong when the Dutch player's contract expired next summer. This is considered a wise transfer strategy of the Gunners.
In the past, coach Mikel Arteta has long expressed his admiration for De Jong. The ability to control the pace of the match, launch the attack as well as the peak experience of De Jong is considered to bring a difference to Arsenal in both the Premier League and the Champions League.
Last season, De Jong played more than 40 matches for Barcelona and played an important role at the La Liga defending team. However, at the Camp Nou, De Jong's contract extension is becoming complicated.
Barcelona wants to retain this player for a long time, but the negotiation process has many obstacles. The first is the financial problem. If you want to stay, De Jong will have to reduce the salary deeply. Besides, De Jong also wants to change the current representative, making the negotiation more difficult.
With only 1 year left, Barca is of course impatient. Because if only needed to be resolved at the end of 2025, De Jong could start negotiating to join the new club in the summer of 2026. At that time, Barca would lose. Even if Barca tries to sell De Jong in the 2026 winter transfer window to collect a sum of money, it is not as expected as expected.
On the Arsenal side, the London Club will be closely monitored in the near future. If Barca could not close the new contract, the Gunners were ready to negotiate directly with De Jong to convince him to join the Emirates. For Arteta, this will be a strategic deal, helping him own one of the most comprehensive midfielders in Europe.
However, Arteta is still “passionate” with De Jong in the context that there are too many central midfielders leading to the question mark for the future of some positions like Mikel Merino or the captain Martin Odegaard. Many people think that Arteta should deprive Odegaard's captain because he lacks the leader. If De Jong nodded to Arsenal, Odegaard's future is not sure to be guaranteed.