Daily Cannon

Tottenham Hotspur are holding direct talks with Crystal Palace today over the potential transfer of Eberechi Eze, with Arsenal’s chances of a deal appearing to fade.

Fabrizio Romano reports that Tottenham Hotspur and Crystal Palace chairmans Daniel Levy and Steve Parish are holding direct talks over Eberechi Eze today. Eze has already informed Palace of his desire to move, so it’s just about reaching a fee agreement now.

Spurs are reportedly willing to offer a fixed fee of £55m with £5m in add-ons, below the player’s release clause of £60m plus £8m in add-ons.

That release clause has expired anyway, so Spurs’ only option is to negotiate a deal with Palace. But the expectation has always been that Palace would want a fee in the region of the clause even after its expiry.

Arsenal have also been linked with Eze throughout the summer window, but the Gunners don’t seem to have taken any steps to formalise that interest ahead of the final fortnight of the summer transfer window.

For Palace’s part, they’ve started to make moves for potential replacements, approaching Club Brugge over Christos Tzolis and Leicester City over Bilal El Khannouss. David Ornstein reported for The Athletic last week that both are serious candidates to replace Eze if he leaves.

Yet Brugge have already rejected one bid for Tzolis, who recently signed a new deal, so he may not be a straightforward signing.

Reports have always suggested that Arsenal would need to make sales before continuing to sign players, having already brought in six first-team players this summer.

Their only sales so far are Nuno Tavares and Marquinhos, both of whom were already out on loan with purchase options before the summer even began.

With outgoings moving so slowly, Arsenal don’t seem to be in a position to enter the bidding for Eze, whether they plan to or not.

Arsenal’s interest in Eberechi Eze remains despite Tottenham Hotspur’s pursuit, but the Gunners can’t make a move until after they sell, according to a report.

Charles Watts reports for CaughtOffside that Arsenal’s interest in Eberechi Eze has never gone away, with the Gunners remaining keen on the midfielder throughout the summer.

Yet it’s always been a deal for the end of the summer window, with the focus currently on sales. Watts reports that a move for Eze feels unlikely until players leave, and nothing is close on that front yet.

As a result, Tottenham Hotspur are in a better position to complete the signing. They seem willing to a deal now, driven by the recent injury to James Maddison.

The Beautiful Game Podcast reported on Tuesday night that Arsenal remain in the race for Eze, but Spurs are currently the more advanced of the two clubs after formalising contact. The report added that the expectation is that a deal could be done under the player’s £68m release clause.

Yet Matt Barlow reports for the Scottish Daily Mail that Arsenal’s interest in Eze has faded “for the time being”, and that though the player was up for joining the Gunners, he’s also interested in the Spurs move.

An Arsenal sale or two in the coming week or two could change the picture and throw the Gunners back into the mix with renewed enthusiasm. But for the time being, Spurs look set to capitalise on the delays from their north London rivals.

Eze made his first appearance of the new campaign in Crystal Palace’s Community Shield win over Liverpool on Sunday, having scored Palace’s winner in the FA Cup final to earn a second Wembley appearance for the club in the first place.

The 27-year-old received positive reviews for his performance despite missing a penalty in the decisive shootout. Palace begin their Premier League season with a match away to Chelsea on Sunday, August 17th.

Leandro Trossard appeared to pick up an injury during Arsenal’s pre-season friendly against Tottenham Hotspur, managing just 17 minutes on the pitch.

Leandro Trossard wasn’t named in the starting lineup for Arsenal’s pre-season match against Tottenham Hotspur on Thursday, but the winger was introduced in the 68th minute with his team 1-0 down.

Yet despite his substitution occurring midway through the second half, Trossard didn’t complete the match, and he was forced off for Reiss Nelson in the 85th minute following an injury.

The setback is a blow for Arsenal, both because it reduces the team’s wide options and also it potentially rules out one of their more sellable assets in the remainder of the transfer window.

Given the primary goal of pre-season is generally to build fitness, Arsenal’s preparations for the new campaign have been somewhat disastrous.

Gabriel Magalhaes suffered a (hopefully minor) injury setback before the trip to Singapore, Riccardo Calafiori picked up an injury against Newcastle United, Kepa Arrizabalaga picked up a training injury, and now Trossard is seemingly injured as well.

There was even some minor concern about Bukayo Saka on Thursday, as he went down after a collision and was immediately withdrawn. Though Arsenal were already preparing substitutes and Saka may have been in line to come off anyway.

The AC Milan game is the only one everyone appeared to come through unscathed, and Arsenal definitely can’t afford further setbacks in their final two friendlies against Villarreal and Athletic Club.

The upside is that both of those matches will be back on the pitch at the Emirates Stadium. The poor quality pitches on tour have likely played some role in the injury issues so far, but that won’t apply to the remainder of pre-season.

Arsenal summer signing Kepa Arrizabalaga has picked up an injury, missing out on the friendly match against Tottenham Hotspur on Thursday.

Arsenal’s squad to face Tottenham Hotspur on Thursday was missing a few first-team players, with Gabriel Magalhaes still absent through injury and Riccardo Calafiori missing out with the minor setback he picked up in the previous friendly against Newcastle United.

Jurrien Timber has recently returned to first-team training, but the match also came too soon for him to be involved.

Yet one unexpected absentee was Kepa Arrizabalaga, who had featured in both of Arsenal’s previous friendly matches in Singapore.

The goalkeeper was also involved in Arsenal’s open training session in Hong Kong, but Tom Canton reports that he picked up an injury during the session.

Though details on the injury are scarce at the moment, one positive sign was that Kepa was seen arriving for the match with the squad without any obvious strapping or protective gear.

With any luck, Kepa, Timber, and Calafiori are all simply victims of an abundance of caution, and Arsenal are just unwilling to take any risks for a pre-season fixture.

Tottenham Hotspur will be without nine players for their match against Arsenal on Thursday, but most of their summer signings will be available.

Tottenham Hotspur are set to face Arsenal in a pre-season friendly match on Thursday, but not all of their first-team players are fit for involvement.

The club have confirmed their pre-season squad travelling to Hong Kong, and Destiny Udogie, Manor Solomon, Radu Dragusin, Dejan Kulusevski, and Bryan Gil have all missed out as they work on their injuries.

New signing Kota Takai is also unavailable for the same reason, whilst Mikey Moore, Alfie Devine, and Dane Scarlett have remained behind to pursue loan opportunities.

The rest of Spurs’ summer signings are all available, including Mohammed Kudus, Mathys Tel, Kevin Danso, and Luka Vuskovic.

Of course, Tel and Danso have already played for Spurs plenty of times before during their loan spells last season, but both arrived too late in the 2024/25 campaign to face Arsenal.

It will be Thomas Frank’s first north London derby as Spurs manager, though he knows Arsenal well from his time with Brentford.

Spurs squad vs Arsenal

George Abbott, Brandon Austin, Rodrigo Bentancur, Lucas Bergvall, Yves Bissouma, Jun’ai Byfield, Kevin Danso, Ben Davies, Jamie Donley, Archie Gray, Luca Gunter, Brennan Johnson, Antonin Kinsky, Mohammed Kudus, Will Lankshear, James Maddison, Wilson Odobert, Pedro Porro, Richarlison, Cristian Romero, Pape Matar Sarr, Dominic Solanke, Heung-Min Son, Djed Spence, Mathys Tel, Micky van de Ven, Guglielmo Vicario, Luka Vuskovic, Yang Min-Hyeok

Viktor Gyokeres has been added to Arsenal’s squad for the pre-season friendly against Tottenham Hotspur on Thursday, but Mikel Arteta has insisted they’ll be cautious with him.

Connor Humm reports that Viktor Gyokeres has officially been added to Arsenal’s squad for the pre-season game against Tottenham Hotspur in Hong Kong on Thursday, with Cristhian Mosquera also included.

That raises the possibility of a debut or two in the midweek fixture, but Mikel Arteta suggested on Sunday that they’ll want to assess Gyokeres’ condition before throwing him in.

“I think he hasn’t had a single training session with the team since the last game with Sporting when they became champions,” Arteta began.

“So we will assess him tomorrow, he’s done all the medicals, everything is looking good but to get him up to speed with the right levels of fitness I think is very important.

“We’re not going to stop him, we want him with us as quick as possible but we’ll have to assess and the medical team will do that.

“He’s been incredible, he was very clear from the beginning where he wanted to play and how passionate I felt from him from day one when we first spoke. You can see the boys, you can see the environment as well, very excited with his arrival.”

It was well documented that Gyokeres had refused to return to training with Sporting CP before his departure for Arsenal, believing the club had gone back on a promise they’d made to let him leave for €60m plus €10m in add-ons.

Arsenal ended up paying €63.5m plus €10m in add-ons, and even that fee was only possible once Gyokeres’ agent agreed to give up his €10m commission.

The striker has been keeping himself fit with individual training sessions, but this week will be the first time he’s been involved in group training since the end of the 2024/25 campaign.

It will be a judgement call whether the work Gyokeres has done in individual training is enough to have him ready for involvement in Thursday’s game.

Tottenham Hotspur have missed out on Morgan Gibbs-White, with the midfielder extending his Nottingham Forest contract ahead of Thursday’s north London derby friendly match.

Just over two weeks ago, it looked as though Tottenham Hotspur were on the verge of announcing the signing of Morgan Gibbs-White from Nottingham Forest.

Multiple reports confirmed that Spurs had triggered the midfielder’s release clause, with a medical booked for July 11th, well in advance of the club’s pre-season trip to Asia.

In all likelihood, Gibbs-White would have been involved in Spurs’ friendly against Arsenal on Thursday if all had gone to plan for them.

But after those initial reports, everything started to fall apart. Sami Mokbel of the BBC was among those to report that Nottingham Forest believed Spurs had made an illegal approach for the player, and that there had been a breach of confidentiality provisions in his contract.

The suggestion was that Spurs hadn’t approached Forest before opening talks with Gibbs-White, and that they’d somehow learned of his £60m release clause despite the fact it should have been confidential.

The Nottingham club hinted at the possibility of legal action against their Premier League rivals, and they prepared a complaint to the Premier League.

In a remarkable turnaround, David Ornstein then broke the news on Saturday that Forest were in talks with Gibbs-White over a new contract. Within hours, the player’s new deal to 2028 was confirmed by his club.

Forest describe the new contract as a “record deal”, so they’ve clearly made a significant financial commitment to convince Gibbs-White to stay for one more year.

The relatively short three-year deal will likely still see the player departing at some point soon, but evidently not this summer, and perhaps not ever to Spurs.

Tottenham Hotspur have been fined £75,000 for homophobic chanting by their supporters during a Premier League match against Manchester United, following abuse aimed at Mikel Arteta and Mason Mount that included references to sexual orientation.

The sanction, initially set at £150,000, was halved by an independent Appeal Board after Spurs admitted two breaches of FA Rule E21, which relates to crowd control and discriminatory behaviour.

The charges stem from incidents during the club’s 3-0 win at Old Trafford on 29 September 2024, where chants from the away section targeted Arsenal’s head coach and Mount, formerly of Chelsea.

The FA found that Tottenham had failed to ensure that their supporters “conduct themselves in an orderly fashion” and “do not use words or otherwise behave in an improper, offensive, abusive, indecent, or insulting way with either an express or implied reference to sexual orientation,” with the breaches occurring around the 49th and 79th minutes.

In addition to the fine, an action plan and formal warning were issued to the club. The FA’s initial ruling was made by an independent Regulatory Commission, before Tottenham’s appeal led to the reduction in financial penalty.

Spurs condemned the abuse in a statement issued shortly after the match. “This is simply unacceptable, hugely offensive and no way to show support for the team,” the club said at the time. “The club will be working with the police and stewards to identify anyone instigating or joining in with the chanting. We shall take action.”

Following links to Arsenal and reports of a potential contract extension with Bayern Munich, Leroy Sane’s agent is now apparently working on a move to Tottenham Hotspur.

Christian Falk of German outlet Bild reports that the latest twist in the Leroy Sane saga is that his agent is working on a deal for him to join Tottenham Hotspur.

The suggestion is that Sane could opt to move to London to stay close to his family, and Spurs CEO Daniel Levy is using his personal relationship with agent Pini Zahavi to try and convince the player to join them over the alternatives.

Sane’s contract with Bayern Munich expires this summer, potentially making him available as a free agent. Though he remains in talks over an extension with his current club.

Bild wrote last week that Bayern sporting director Max Eberl had met with Zahavi this week. The winger’s agent said afterwards: “It was a good meeting, a nice meal. But there’s no news (on an extension) yet.”

Bild claim that their sources inform them that both sides are fundamentally interested in a contract extension. It’s seemingly just a matter of finding a compromise they’re both happy with.

Yet as well as Spurs, Arsenal are seemingly in the mix for Sane if he opts not to stay in Munich.

Multiple English media sources reported last week that Arsenal were considering pursuing Sane’s free transfer.

Gary Jacob and Paul Joyce wrote for The Times that Arsenal were showing strong interest, with Mikel Arteta keen to target a winger this summer.

Mike McGrath confirmed for The Telegraph that Arsenal had made enquiries over Sane, as one of a few clubs who have asked about the conditions of a deal.

But even now, it still seems most likely that Sane opts to remain with Bayern Munich. We’ve seen a number of players linked with moves away from Bayern whilst in contract talks, and they generally end up opting to stay.

Leroy Sane isn’t interested in joining Tottenham Hotspur, and Arsenal are the only club that appeal to him in the Premier League, according to a report from Germany.

Tobias Altschaffl reports for Bild that Leroy Sane’s interest in a move to Tottenham Hotspur is low. Arsenal are reportedly the only club that appeal to Sane in the Premier League, though he has plenty of other options.

Those options include concrete offers from Saudi Arabia and Turkey, with the player seriously considering the possibility of a move to Galatasaray.

Bayern Munich are also still trying to keep the winger, and he’d ideally prefer to extend his contract to stay where he is. The 29-year-old isn’t yet happy with the terms on offer, but the extension deal remains on the table if he changes his mind.

Christian Falk and The Athletic’s James McNicholas confirmed this week that senior figures at Arsenal had held talks with Sane over a potential move, though only as one of a number of options the club are targeting.

Gary Jacob and Paul Joyce previously wrote for The Times that Arsenal were showing strong interest, with Mikel Arteta keen to target a winger this summer.

Mike McGrath confirmed for The Telegraph that Arsenal had made enquiries over Sane, as one of a few clubs who have asked about the conditions of a deal.

As it stands, Sane’s deal with Bayern is running down, and he’ll be available as a free agent next month.

Sane made 45 appearances for Bayern in 2024/25, scoring 13 goals and providing six assists. Only 25 of those 45 games were starts, as he’s struggled to hold down a consistent spot in the lineup.