Ya know, with every man and his dog saying Cahill would be perfect for us, if I were Bolton and we came in for him I'd think "ooh Arsenal want'im. That'll be thirty million quid please fank yoo"

He only has a year left on his contract and has made it publicly known he is leaving this summer come what may. No way they can get more than £15M for him.

depends if a bidding war kicks off - he's linked with pool, spurs, city and us

City might come in and blow everyone out of the water, but I doubt it. The rest will offer what they think is fair, and once an offer is accepted from one, the rest will just match it, then the choice will be Cahill's.

Hopefully we're one of the "rest".

That might happen. Or nobody might match. Or everybody might match and then someone will raise the stakes again.

I can't see any of Liverpool, Spurs, or ourselves coming in and paying way over the odds, so the likelihood is that Cahill will decide where he wants to go, with 2 or 3 clubs stumping up the amount Bolton are looking for. I strongly fancy Liverpool to get him tbh.

Just start the bidding at 15 million pounds and see what happens. A healthy Vermaelen next to Cahill means we need to spend another half season learning defense, but it points to happier days for the next 5 years.

Do 'bidding wars' happen very often anyway? Seems to me that most of the time clubs negotiate with the player first, then the player tells his club where he wants to go, then the two clubs work out an acceptable fee.

I don't really know.

I reckon deals break down over far smaller sums of money more often than people realise though, especially when it comes to teams that aren't
Chelsea or Man City.

Nah, they don't.

Well, we know when Arsenal are involved, they do.

Edit: Unless you mean bidding wars....

Yes, I meant bidding wars. Clearest example I can think of is the way in which we missed out on Baptista.

I don't see the obsession with Cahill. He's really not much better than Koscielny and that guy has only two years of top flight football.

still think we should take a run at Mexes in the summer.. would be cheaper than Cahill (i.e. a free transfer), and vastly more experienced.. (though, he's likely going to Milan and wants to stay in Italy)

i think mexes has already agreed to go to milan, same with taye taiwo. looks like milan are doing their signings early and credit to them, those players are really good too.

Don't think mexes is cut out for English football

Cahill's hardly the finished article, but you compare him to Koscielny and it's easy to get frustrated with Wenger.

Have seen Cahill make glaring mistakes too.

I've also seen him talk to other players. Something I'm pretty sure I've never seen Koscielny do.