£16m Arsenal Signing SNUBBED Man Utd
Sokratis Papastathopoulos was offered an Old Trafford move first.
TEAMtalk are reporting that new Arsenal signing Sokratis Papastathopoulos favoured a move to the Emirates over Man Utd this summer.
The player's father claimed his son was offered a transfer to Old Trafford, but any potential deal would have been pushed back to July. Keen to make the leap from Germany's Bundesliga to the Premier League quickly, Sokratis jumped at the opportunity to become Unai Emery's first signing as Arsenal boss.
A fee of £16 million has been agreed, although some sources (including TEAMtalk) say the figure will rise to £17 million. Whatever the slight difference between reported numbers ends up being, the defender will complete his medical with the London side over the next few days.
Claims that Sokratis talked terms with United first make sense. The Manchester club have enjoyed a fruitful relationship with Dortmund over the past few years, so there's bound to be contact there. It's interesting then that the 29-year old Greek centre back chose Emery's Arsenal revolution as the best way to make his mark in England.
Arsenal's head of recruitment Sven Mislintat, who worked at Dortmund, likely had something to do with his choice.