Arsenal were in talks during the summer to sign Emerson Royal from Barcelona, according to The Guardian.
The report claims that Gunners sporting director Edu had progressed discussions with Barcelona to an advanced stage and had also spoken to the defender, only for Mikel Arteta to pull the plug on a proposed deal.
Arteta was said to have been left unconvinced over Brazilian international despite the club’s analytics department also giving their approval of the pursuit.
Arsenal instead ended up moving for Bologna’s Takehiro Tomiyasu, who had been heavily linked with a move to Tottenham during the course of the summer, with the player himself claiming he rejected a move to the white half of north London a matter of hours before sealing a move to the Emirates (DAZN Japan / Mirror).
Tottenham ended up paying the Catalan giants £25.7million to land Royal while Nuno Espirito Santo was still in charge.
Antonio Conte is reported to be of the opinion that Royal is not the right fit to operate in his preferred system of utilising wing-backs, especially going forward (The Times).
SpursWeb Opinion
Tottenham have had issues at right-back since the departures of Kyle Walker and Kieran Trippier, why the club did not consider a move for Trippier who has since joined Newcastle is questionable rather than the prospect of attempting to convert Adama Traore to play the position.
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