25-year-old who Arteta refused to re-sign for Arsenal has just won a league title

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Well, it hasn’t proven a disastrous season for Dani Ceballos after all, despite his failed transfer to Arsenal.

The Spain international had spent the past two seasons on loan at Arsenal from Real Madrid.

So when the Gunners had a chance to sign him permanently last summer, Mikel Arteta rejected the opportunity.

The 25-year-old wound up staying in the Spanish capital and originally it looked an awful development, considering he didn’t appear to be anywhere close to Carlo Ancelotti’s senior squad.

However, Ceballos has just won La Liga under the Italian and therefore maybe this season wasn’t a complete failure after all.

Okay so he hardly played every game in helping Real to this domestic dominance.

In fact, he only managed nine appearances in this competition all season – and only two starts.

But Ceballos was the picture of happiness after the game as he paraded the trophy.

Here’s how he reacted to the 4-0 win over Espanyol on Instagram on Saturday:

Right decision?

Arsenal are fourth in the Premier League standings and looking better without Ceballos than they ever did with him.

However, it would be a mistake to consider that this improvement is down to the Spaniard leaving North London.

The truth is, Arteta’s outfit have struggled when it comes to big chance creation throughout the entire Premier League season and with Ceballos being an attacking player, well perhaps having him in the squad wouldn’t have been a terrible thing.

After all, he would’ve only cost Arsenal £22 million last summer [La Razon] but having said that, if Arteta’s troops do finally qualify for the Champions League – and they’re favourites to do so from this position – then nobody will care about Ceballos’s domestic success this season or even remember that he used to play for the Emirates Stadium club.