Gary Lineker drops surprise Arsenal transfer £81m bombshell after Man Utd defeat

Arsenal slipped to a disappointing home defeat at the hands of Manchester United on Sunday afternoon – as their fight for a first title since 2004 goes on.

Former England striker Gary Lineker thinks Arsenal should look to sign Atletico Madrid forward Julian Alvarez. The Gunners suffered their first home defeat of the season on Sunday afternoon after losing 3-2 to Manchester United.

Manchester City and Aston Villa are now just four points behind Mikel Arteta’s side, with their hopes of winning a first top-flight title since 2004 dented. Arsenal’s attacking players have struggled to fire on all cylinders this season, with ‘own goals’ their third top scorer in the league.

Striker Viktor Gyokeres has been unconvincing since completing his £64million transfer to the Emirates Stadium, while another attacking summer signing, Eberechi Eze, has no league goals since November. Recent reports have claimed that a move for former Manchester City striker Alvarez was discussed last summer.

And Lineker has shared his view on Alvarez to Arsenal on Monday’s The Rest Is Football podcast. He saud that the Argentine is unhappy in Madrid. He said: “They’ve not got anyone really banging in the goals on a regular basis. Gabriel Jesus has come back and scored one or two, but there was a reason they needed to sign a new No.9 in the first place.

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“‘I like Jesus and always have, and he’s got a great work ethic, he chases and harries and gets a few goals. He’s a bit streaky – when he’s on he’s on, but when he’s off he a bit of a confidence player.

“It’s probably complete [nonsense] as most of these things are on social media, but I saw they were linked with Julian Alvarez, who I know is not entirely happy with life at Atletico.

“Now that’s the sort of player you know can handle the big occasion, he’s a World Cup winner for crying out loud. Someone like that at Arsenal would be game over. But they do need one or two of these current forwards to start scoring on a reasonably regular basis.”

Arteta has previously said the club are prepared to ease their injury problems by looking at signing new players in January. However, little business has been done yet and any major moves this month seem unlikely at present.

Speaking last month, the Spaniard said: “The window is there and I mean we’re Arsenal and we have to be looking at it; ‘Okay, what do we need’? And we have to be actively looking and then, whether we can do it or not… that’s a different story.

“But our job is to always be very prepared because something can happen, so hopefully it’ll be very positive.

“When you look across the other clubs, they have 24 or 25 squad players. Although we have had more injuries than expected, some of them not avoidable.

“We want to be better and we know how important the part of having the right availability with players is going to be this season.”

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