Levante goalkeeper Aitor Fernandez has admitted that Arsenal tried to sign him during the summer transfer window, while speaking to AS.
While Alex Runarsson is very much the stereotypical second-choice goalkeeper – young, improving and desperate to make his name at a major club for the first time – Fernandez finds himself in a rather different situation.
At the age of 29, a late-blooming Spaniard who was playing second-tier football with Numancia as recently as 2018 is a La Liga star at long last, his cat-like reflexes earning him plenty of admirers on the Castellon coast and beyond.
So it makes little sense for Aitor, just a few months from his 30th birthday, to leave Levante for a club where he would spend the majority of his time watching on from the sidelines.
And, having signed a new contract complete with a £25 million release clause as recently as a year ago, Aitor is clearly settled at a Levante who have more than enough talent to turn things around after winning just one of their first eight La Liga games this season.
“Yes it is true,” Aitor said when asked about interest from Arsenal and Athletic Bilbao. “There has been contact.
“It is true that those two are true. But here, I am very happy. The club gave me the assurances that they wanted me to stay here and I wanted to stay here.”
As Emi Martinez will tell you, it is no fun waiting years for an opportunity, even at one of the biggest clubs in the European game.
The long-serving Argentine departed after a decade in North London this summer and is finally establishing himself as one of the Premier League’s finest shot-stoppers at Aston Villa.
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