Ally McCoist has claimed that he would ‘bite your hand off’ if he was offered a three-year deal like Arsenal summer transfer target, N’Golo Kante, has supposedly been offered at Chelsea, as he told talkSPORT.
The former Scotland international added that, at the age of 31, and with recent injury concerns, there should be no reason Kante should be turning down Chelsea’s new contract offer.
But it has been suggested that the World Cup winner is unwilling to put pen-to-paper on a new deal – he will become a free-transfer next summer.
Mikel Arteta was hunting right until the last minute for a midfielder on transfer deadline day, only for Aston Villa to turn down several offers from the London club for Douglas Luiz.
In terms of injury problems in Arsenal’s midfield, they can’t do anything about it now, other than hope key players return, but it will be interesting to see if they knock on anybody’s door in January because several names, alongside Kante and Luiz, have been linked.
Either way, with this new contract seemingly on the table for Kante, it has been suggested by McCoist that there must be other issues, beyond the length he has been offered, behind his reason to turn down a new deal.
“We are guessing again because we don’t know the ins and outs of the contract,” said McCoist.
“If you ask me right now, and I am on the outside looking in, if I am 31, I have had one or two injury problems, like Kante has, then there is a three-year contract, I would bite your hand off for that. That’s assuming I want to stay.
“But we don’t know the ins and outs of his contract. There could be he has to play so many games because of his injury. There are things written into individual contracts and this might be the case.
“The wee fella might not be happy with that. It might not be the length of contract he’s unhappy with. It might be a few stipulations within the contract.”
SHOULD KANTE SIGN A NEW DEAL?
There’s no doubt that if the former Leicester City star heads for the Chelsea exit door next summer, then there will be a host of top clubs willing to sign him up.
But the West London club are under new management, with Graham Potter replacing the recently-sacked Thomas Tuchel in the dugout.
Kante is a Potter-like player, so it wouldn’t be a surprise if he is urging the player to sign a new contract himself.
But there is a clear issue somewhere and it will be interesting to see if Arsenal, who need a midfielder and have had a habit of signing ageing Chelsea players before, knock for his services again in January.
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