@lorddulaarsenal wrote:

He looks good. Lot to be said for tremendous pace and power these days

Prefer him to Calum Chambers?

Nope I'd rather Chambers. He looks more comfortable on the ball and is taller and has good strengh without having to rely on an unreal leap

English too

Strong rumours now. Think we'll sign him. Not sure what I think about that.

@lorddulaarsenal wrote:

Nope I'd rather Chambers. He looks more comfortable on the ball and is taller and has good strengh without having to rely on an unreal leap

English too

Only thing with Chambers is he doesn't look that quick. Pace counts for so much in the fullback position.

evoh wrote:

Aurier was voted 3rd best player in France behind James Rodriguez and Zlatan.

Good enough?

As far as I can see, he wasn't even nominated and Marco Veratti won the young player award?

Disappointing, you had me convinced he's quality. That sort of recognition is hard to argue with.

He was in the team of the year and nominated for young player of the year.

Is @AgentJim reliable? Says bid accepted for Aurier. Take with a pinch of salt.

He wasn't nominated for the best player in France by UNFP, which was the most surprising claim. Didn't win young player of the year either.

Are there even any decent rightbacks in Ligue 1? There can't be much competition. In the last couple of years stars such as Rod Fanni, Anthony Réveillère, Mathieu Debuchy and Christophe Jallet have been included the team of the season. None of them hold a candle to Sagna.

These are the official awards for what it's worth:

Ligue 1 Player of the Year

Zlatan Ibrahimovic (Paris Saint-Germain)

Goalkeeper of the Year

Salvatore Sirigu (Paris Saint-Germain)

Young Player of the Year

Marco Verratti (Paris Saint-Germain)

Coach of the Year

René Girard (LOSC Lille)

Ligue 1 Team of the Year

Salvatore Sirigu (Paris Saint-Germain); Serge Aurier (Toulouse), Thiago Silva (Paris Saint-Germain), Loïc Perrin (Saint-Etienne), Layvin Kurzawa (Monaco); Marco Verratti, Thiago Motta (both Paris Saint-Germain), James Rodríguez (Monaco); Alexandre Lacazette (Lyon), Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Edinson Cavani (both Paris Saint-Germain)

http://www.ligue1.com/ligue1/article/ibrahimovic-named-player-of-year.htm

Saw that, but couldn't find which players were runners up and third in each category. That would have been more interesting.

I don't think they reveal that. I've never seen it listed anywhere. There are a number of players who would likely hold more votes than Aurier though, such as Rodríguez and Lacazette.

Not according to France Football Weekly!

Hmm. Good point. Can't argue with their selection because I haven't seen most of the players they list, but it differs in many ways from the official one.

From some of the talk in here it sounds like he would even be an improvement on Sagna? Can he really be that good?

How reliable is he in the air? Apparantly he's rather short.

In attack they say he will be better but not in defence.

Nela wrote:

From some of the talk in here it sounds like he would even be an improvement on Sagna? Can he really be that good?

How reliable is he in the air? Apparantly he's rather short.

Looks beastly in the air from those YouTube compilations. Not the tallest but possesses a godly leap much like Sagna.

He looks pretty poor. Very nervous about our fullback situation. Nothing we could do to match a £150k/week contract but we need to sign a better replacement.

I do not know of any other option now that Sagna is gone and i feel Jenks isn't ready yet. Based solely on yt videos, this guy looks like a robustly built player and that is a good start. If we get him, i hope he plays strong and not like Andre Santos!

How much will he cost?

I find stats (like those listed on the prior page) relatively unconvincing when judging a player. Wouldn't be surprised to see Gibbs have comparable or "better" stats than Sagna and yet we all know Sagna is miles ahead of Gibbs (particularly defensively).

I don't think Gibbs defensive stats would be close to Sagnas.

What would put me off about those stats is trying to compare Ligue Uh to the Premier League.

I think what Mr T means is stats not measuring intangibles.

If we asked Toulouse for a straight swap between Sagna and Aurier they would probably laugh and think we were pulling their leg.

Yeah because Sagna is a free agent.

7 days later

A guy on twitter saying he met Aurier yesterday (in Ivory Coast training camp, he has a picture with Aurier) and he says he has a video on him confirming he's joining Arsenal.

marv3llous wrote:

A guy on twitter saying he met Aurier yesterday (in Ivory Coast training camp, he has a picture with Aurier) and he says he has a video on him confirming he's joining Arsenal.

If true it is fantastic news. I think he will be a revelation here and has pedigree to play a starting role.

This seals it for me:

@Hektor1886 has always been a reliable source

"too many tweets make a twat" - David Cameron

Le professeur wrote:

Rumour has it that Kandzet once spent a summer as an exchange student with Mr.Xs neighbours cousin.

😆

Aurier himself is now retweeting a tweet from a fan with a video of Aurier apparantly telling the fan he's coming to Arsenal.

Hopefully this one is done so we can move on to more pressing issues.

😆 not sure he understood the question, was just saying yes to anything

That's the impression I got too. Just kept saying yes

On https://twitter.com/Serge_Aurier he retweeted the video that clearly says "Serge Aurier tells an Arsenal fan that he is joining Arsenal". I don't know what to make of this

Yeah the video is not as encouraging as i thought, he seemed confused more than anything.

I'm sure he understood otherwise why would he retweet it? As far as I'm concerned this is a done deal.