@afcfranchise, 25 June 2026: “Tonali has informed his agents he prefers a move to Arsenal and Man City over Tottenham. Tottenham’s current bid is short of Newcastle’s valuation, but there is still optimism from Spurs’ point of view that they get a deal done. If Arsenal or Man City entered the race late, the Italian would know his pick.”
This is the kind of report Arsenal supporters love to read and Arsenal’s recruitment team probably regard with a little more caution, because being a player’s preferred destination is only useful if the club is actually prepared to act on it.
Sandro Tonali has reportedly told his own representatives that, given a genuine choice, he would rather join Arsenal or Manchester City than Tottenham, who have spent weeks doing the unglamorous groundwork of agreeing personal terms and tabling two separate bids to Newcastle. Arsenal, by contrast, have done almost none of that work, and the gap between being preferred and being engaged is exactly where this story gets interesting.
Arsenal’s interest in Tonali is not new, and it predates this entire summer’s saga
Embed from Getty Images
ESPN reported that Arsenal sounded out the possibility of signing him as far back as January, well before Tottenham turned their attention to the Italian in any serious way. That early interest has simply never translated into the kind of concrete movement that defines a genuine pursuit, mostly because Arsenal’s midfield priorities this summer have pointed elsewhere.
Andrea Berta has spent the window working through Ayyoub Bouaddi, Alex Scott and a wider net of attacking reinforcements, and a contested, expensive central midfielder behind Declan Rice and Martin Zubimendi has not been treated as the most urgent gap to fill.
That calculation is entirely reasonable on its own terms. Arsenal already possess arguably the best double pivot in the Premier League, and adding Tonali on top of that pairing would represent squad depth rather than a clear upgrade to the starting XI, at least in the short term. It is a very different proposition to Tottenham, where De Zerbi has identified Tonali as the single player capable of dictating tempo and progressing the ball through midfield in exactly the way his system demands, making him a genuine first-choice target rather than a contingency option.
Laid out like that, the picture is almost the inverse of a normal transfer race. Usually the club furthest ahead in talks is also the club the player most wants to join, and the contest is about whether a rival can disrupt that alignment with money or persuasion. Here, the club furthest ahead, Tottenham, is reportedly not the player’s first choice at all, while the two clubs he is said to prefer, Arsenal and Manchester City, have not yet put their money where their reported preference is.
That is an unusual position for Arsenal to find themselves in: holding the emotional advantage in a transfer they have barely begun to fight for.
A late move is realistic, but it needs to clear three specific hurdles
Embed from Getty Images
What Arsenal would need to do to turn preference into a deal
Match or exceed Newcastle’s £100 million valuation, a figure Tottenham have so far failed to reach twice
Decide Tonali is worth prioritising ahead of, or alongside, the existing Bouaddi and Scott pursuits already in motion
Move fast enough that Tottenham do not get there first while Arsenal deliberate, since every week of inaction narrows the window
Convince Berta and Arteta that a third central midfielder genuinely improves the squad rather than simply adding depth behind Rice and Zubimendi
None of those hurdles are insurmountable, and Arsenal’s summer recruitment so far suggests a club willing to move decisively once a target is locked in, as the Mosquera and Monga deals both demonstrated. But Tonali sits in a slightly different category. He is an established, 26-year-old Italy international with a near-£100 million price tag attached, not a wonderkid available at a discount, and committing that kind of fee to a position Arsenal have already addressed at the top end of the squad is a genuinely different calculation to the bargains Berta has specialised in finding elsewhere this summer.
There is also the financial reality of Arsenal’s spending so far to consider. Significant money has already gone toward Tzolis, Monga, and the pursuits of Bouaddi and Scott, with more reportedly being lined up. A £100 million outlay on a midfielder who would not obviously start ahead of the existing pairing requires either a genuine tactical reason from Arteta or a belief that the long-term squad-building value outweighs the immediate cost. Whether that case can be made internally is the real question here, far more than whether Tonali himself would say yes.
There is a reasonable counter-argument for Arsenal to take this report seriously regardless of their current priorities. Tonali is precisely the kind of player who rarely becomes available on these terms again. A 26-year-old at his physical and footballing peak, with Champions League pedigree from his time at AC Milan, who has openly stated he wants Premier League continuity rather than a return to Serie A, and who has now reportedly told his own representatives he would choose Arsenal over a club actively trying to sign him. Opportunities of that specific shape, an elite player essentially pre-sold on a move, do not come around often, and missing it now because the timing did not suit the broader recruitment plan could look like a costly oversight a year from now if Tonali goes on to thrive at Tottenham or Manchester City instead.
The flip side is equally real. Arsenal have built their recent transfer success on discipline and patience rather than chasing every player linked with them, and chasing a £100 million midfielder purely because he has expressed a preference, without a clear tactical need driving the decision, would represent a departure from exactly the model that has made this summer’s business look so sharp so far.
Related Items:Newcastle United, Sandro Tonali, Tottenham Hotspur
Recommended for you
Gibbs-White-Tottenham-Transfer Gibbs-White-Tottenham-Transfer
“Pathway to senior football…” – Arsenal move emerges for Tottenham defensive talent
Gibbs-White-Tottenham-Transfer Gibbs-White-Tottenham-Transfer
Arsenal are looking at 19 G/A midfielder who was close to joining Tottenham as Eze alternative last summer
Cristhian-Mosquera Cristhian-Mosquera
The £57m reason Arsenal fans should feel absolutely no sympathy for Tottenham right now
Click to comment