Arsenal transfer ‘mistake’ exposed as Mikel Arteta will ‘regret’ not signing £40m Tottenham star

Lewis Oldham 21 Sep 2023 1:05 PM

Arsenal star Havertz — Arsenal's Kai Havertz and Tottenham's James Maddison.

It’s been claimed that Arsenal will “regret” signing former Chelsea flop Kai Havertz over Tottenham Hotspur newbie James Maddison.

Havertz was one of Arsenal’s marquee signings during the summer transfer window. Around £65m was splashed out by the Gunners to snatch him from London rivals Chelsea.

The Germany has endured a rough start at the Emirates and he dropped out of the starting XI when they faced Everton at Goodison Park over the weekend.

Maddison meanwhile has hit the ground running at Tottenham following his £40m move from Leicester City.

Arsenal, Chelsea and Newcastle United have all been linked with Maddison in recent years but Spurs won the race to sign him.

The England international has quickly proven to be one of the signings of the season in the Premier League as he has enjoyed a dream start at Spurs. He has grabbed two goals and two assists from their opening five games.

Journalist Dean Jones has now suggested that “there will be some regrets around Arsenal” after they “didn’t push harder” to sign Maddison.

“Arsenal thought they got a very smart deal out of Havertz and they couldn’t believe really, they had the opportunity to sign who they saw as well, Chelsea’s best players,” Jones told GiveMeSport.

“But you look at it now and obviously, in hindsight, you would rather have James Maddison in your team, than Havertz. I’m not sure how realistic Maddison was, but obviously, he was on the transfer market and he was available at a very reasonable fee.

“So you look at it in broad daylight, and you think Arsenal could have got him. They’ve now made a mistake really by not getting him and allowing him to go to their north London rivals.

“I mean, we’ll see but if Maddison ends up being the difference between these two sides when they meet at the weekend, then there will be some regrets I think around Arsenal that they didn’t push harder to get that deal done. But as I say at the time, they really felt that Havertz was a great signing.”

Havertz put in an improved performance on Wednesday night as Arsenal beat PSV Eindhoven 4-0 in their first Champions League group game.

After this impressive victory at the Emirates, Mikel Arteta praised his “intelligent” forward.

“Yeah, he [Havertz] was really connected today in the game,” Arteta said post-match

“It’s true I asked him to play two different roles in regards to the behaviours of the opponents and he’s so intelligent that he does it. It’s just finishing one or two actions that we had but it’s coming and he’s so willing to do it.”

Arsenal James Maddison