Arsenal have spent more money this summer than ever before following the purchases of defender Shkodran Mustafi and striker Lucas Perez on the penultimate day of the transfer window.
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The Gunners recorded their first victory of the 2016/17 Premier League campaign on Saturday afternoon after a 3-1 win at Watford. Following the match, the north London club manager Arsene Wenger confirmed the deals for Lucas Perez and the centre-back will be completed this week.
Mustafi’s arrival followed hot on the heels of Lucas Perez’s £17million move from Deportivo de La Coruña. In addition to this, Arsenal strengthened their back four by adding German worldwide to the heart of their defence.
Perez and Mustafi have joined the likes of Granit Xhaka and the young trio of Rob Holding, Takuma Asano and Kelechi Nwakali as Arsenal’s summer recruits for this season. He began his senior career by coming through the academy at Everton before spending two years with Sampdoria in Serie A.
On August 12, Gunners supporter Daniel Floyd tweeted he would pay everyone who retweeted a status concerning Mustafi £20 if the Germany global left Valencia to move to Emirates Stadium.
Wenger is delighted to have added the World Cup victor with Germany to the squad.
“He is at the right age”.
Mustafi will become the third reigning World Cup victor to ply his trade at the Emirates as he will join his 2014 Germany teammates Per Mertesacker and Mesut Ozil – the Gunners also had Lukas Podolski on their books before he joined Galatasaray.
“I hope he has no setback because he is an intelligent player, he is focused and has a great desire to prove his critics wrong and he’s on a good way”, the Frenchman added.
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“I will give it my all to justify the German World Cup victor tradition at Arsenal which was started by Lukas Podolski”, Mustafi said.
