Gyokeres and Arsenal - green light blinking

After months and weeks of uncertainty and complications, the club-level saga surrounding Viktor Gyokeres’ future has started to unravel.

The Swedish goal-machine from Lisbon's Sporting is now close to joining Arsenal. Concrete negotiations between all three parties are in full swing... Close, but the London club still needs to make a bit more effort. After threatening a boycott and refusing to show up for pre-season and training, the Swede has forced Sporting to back down and enter talks with Arsenal, who have been pursuing him for months.

However, Sporting’s leadership won’t give in to the demands of his agent Hasan Cetinkaya, who appears to be the “bad guy” in the whole story. Gyokeres joined Sporting from Coventry two years ago for 20 million plus 4 million in bonuses.

Over those two seasons, he took the football world by storm, scoring 97 goals in 102 matches. But he remained locked in a five-year contract worth just 1.5 million per season and with a 100 million release clause. Sporting has made it clear they won’t let Gyokeres go below what they consider his fair market value — 80 million. In other words, they’re not insisting on the full clause unless Cetinkaya continues with his threats.

Gyokeres's secret clause revealed amid Arsenal interest

Arsenal now has a clearer picture of what Sporting wants — helped partly by Leipzig’s move for Sesko and partly by the Swedish striker’s gesture to accept a lower salary. In recent days, the Gunners first entered concrete talks with Cetinkaya and Gyokeres to settle that piece of the puzzle.

And today, they succeeded. According to reports from Portugal, Gyokeres has agreed to a five-year contract worth 8.5 million per season. Reportedly, he could have earned 10.5 million but gave that up so Arsenal could improve their offer to Sporting.

The London club is currently offering 65 million fixed plus 15 million in bonuses — which theoretically matches Sporting’s asking price. However, the Lisbon club has not (yet) accepted the offer and insists on 70 million fixed plus 10 million in easily attainable bonuses. For example, they don’t want the bonuses tied to Arsenal winning trophies — because Arsenal rarely wins them.

Considering how things stood just a few days ago, all three sides are now very close to reaching an agreement, needing only a bit more effort to bring the story to a happy ending for everyone. Negotiations between the two clubs are still ongoing, so everything could be finalized by morning.