Burnwinter Those are serious numbers he put up last season, he is 29 and from an age point of view is the wrong profile. But his hold up play is excellent, he is good in transition and he fits right in from day 1.

He might only give us 2 or 3 top seasons so from that point of view £60m is steep. He probably wouldn't be my first choice for a striker but we don't know what is going on in the market. I know some desperately want Isak but I think Newcastle will sell Gordon and Bruno before they sell him and they are backed by the Saudis, even £150m they could laugh off. We do need to a sign a younger CF as well so I do understand the reservations of blowing our money on Watkins. Someone like Jhon Duran would have been more ideal imo.

JazzG Duran who just came from MLS and has 10 top class goals to his name total is going for 77m. That feels like an enormous risk at that price - but also highlights the lack of options at that position if these are the prices people are willing to pay.

I will admit, there is no particularly outstanding characteristic that Watkins brings. He is a guy who does everything 80% well, which makes him a great all rounder. So he is a bit underwhelming from that end. It's usually great to see someone who has an edge quality like speed, strength, dribbling. He just does everything well enough. But the numbers over a few seasons are good. And with all our injuries, I just like the idea that if I sit Havertz, I can have a veteran Watkins on the field next to Nwaneri, etc.

I didn't realise that uefa had changed its registration rules in 2018 to allow players to switch clubs for hte knockout stage. So we can register up to 3 players who have already participated in the contest. We can sign Gyokeres, Sesko and Watkins for the games. Thought we could only use them domestically

daredevil I didn't realize we tried to sign Watkins in the summer. Nevermind then.

Gazza M

Wow, Emery is down for a sale.

QuincyAbeyie

We did try for Sesko who is a striker, so it's not some sudden realisation.

Watkins is clearly us going further down our target list, given our desperation now that Saka and Jesus are potentially out for the season and Sterling has turned out to be trash. That was not the case in the summer, it is now, hence my question did you just wake up from a coma. We are desperate, we need to sign someone.

What are we discussing here? You want to criticise the club for not signing a striker, and now you want to criticise for wanting to sign a striker. Lol.

daredevil What are we discussing here? You want to criticise the club for not signing a striker, and now you want to criticise for wanting to sign a striker. Lol.

I'm not. I'm saying that if Wakins is someone of interest, it wasn't the right call in the summer to hold off because our wanted targets weren't available. "Lol."

But you're saying it was right to wait in the summer because our players hadn't become injured yet at the time, while now they have. I guess we just disagree about whether we should build our squad based on the possibility of injuries or not.

I like the look of Rogers from Villa. He's more exciting than Watkins is. Different role/position, but he's got a bit of growing to do and if he continues to build on his form this season he'll get a bigger move soon enough. He was magnificent in their game against City a few months back.

Claudius Striker markets have always been tough, very few top class ones around so even the ones who aren't top top tier or top prospects go for stupid money.

Jhon Duran is averaging a goal every 90mins I think in this league, the money is crazy but if clubs cough it up they'll have seen the guy and watched him carefully in this league for 3 seasons now so will have a good idea if he'll step up or not. I think around £60m would have been fair for him in this market but Saudi's paying stupid money for their project

I think @Sicario touched on it earlier, Fergie signed RvP basically to win them the title. Different circumstances as Fergie was about to retire so desperately wanted that last title. Maybe Arteta thinks Watkins can be the one to get us over that phycological barrier and win us the title? Even if it is a waste of resources and we might have to bin him in a few years. I don't know I'm just throwing that out there.

To me it looks like Sesko isn't interested. We tried last summer, tried again this window and he's not moving. Time to move on.

Qwiss That is a possibility, sometimes you get a vibe that a player isn't all that committed to joining so you need to move on.

Doesn't look like Watkins is possible now so I hope we have other options!

Qwiss

Yeah, fuck him.

I don't understand how some kid who's barely done anything at the top level wouldn't be interested in joining us.

Tam Yeah Rogers does indeed look good, he ran rings around our midfield at Villa park this season but Boubacar Kamara tops my wishlist among Villa players. He doesn't have any hype but he's a genuinely good footballer. Hope we bring him in for Partey this summer.

Bring Back Kerrea Gilbert maybe he's seen all the young strikers who've gone to Chelsea and United and farted away their careers, and thinks better of it to stay in a place where he is a priority

Bring Back Kerrea Gilbert Agents and advisers play a big part in that, some of them will push players in the direction of where they get a massive fee and that isn't Arsenal!