Arsenal could soon make a signing even more risky than Nicolas Pepe – Our View

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Arsenal are one of the biggest and best teams in world football, but the Gunners have had their fair share of transfer shockers in their time.

From Igors Stepanovs to Yaya Sanogo, the Gunners have signed their fair share of duds, but perhaps their most high-profile transfer error involved Nicolas Pepe.

At £72m, Pepe was the Gunners’ record signing, and, sadly, it’s fair to say that the Ivorian hasn’t proven to be value for money.

The winger scored just one league goal in his most recent campaign for the north London club, and even prior to last term, he wasn’t good enough.

Arsenal signed Pepe off the back of one good season in France, and at the time, it looked like something of a risk as Pepe was an unproven commodity in a league that you can’t always rely on to produce quality players.

Unfortunately, it seems like Arsenal haven’t learned from their mistakes as The Independent are now reporting that the Gunners could spend £100m on RB Leipzig’s Christopher Nkunku.

Now, we’re not saying that Nkunku is a bad footballer. He’s been incredibly impressive for Leipzig and after scoring 20 league goals this season, he’s one of the hottest properties in Europe.

However, making Nkunku the Premier League’s joint-record signing could be a very naïve move from Arsenal.

Prior to this term, the highest goal tally achieved by Nkunku in a league season was just six, and it looks like his 20-goal haul this term may have just been the result of a serious purple patch rather than a genuine reflection of his quality.

We hate to bang the overly-cliche ‘Bundesliga tax’ drum, but there is also something to be said about players from Germany struggling to make their mark in England, just look at Jadon Sancho, Timo Werner and Kai Havertz in recent times.

Performances prior to 2020/21 indicate that Nkunku could well follow in their footsteps, and that’s something Arsenal must be wary of.

The Frenchman is a talented player, and it is worth rolling the dice on signing him this summer, but we can’t help but feel that for £100m, there are more proven options available who would be a safer bet for Arsenal.