Darren Bent believes that even if Liverpool made a proposal of £150 million to acquire Bukayo Saka in order to replace Mohamed Salah, Arsenal “just wouldn’t sell” him.
The Reds are in a tough situation because Al-Ittihad is trying to wrest Salah away from them. Although sources indicate that the Saudi side may give up to £200 million, Jurgen Klopp’s team has rejected an offer that was above £100 million.
In fact, the commentator recommended Liverpool test Arsenal’s fortitude by making a $150 million offer for the young English star.
Bent, a former Premier League forward, doesn’t think the Gunners will trade him even for that absurd sum.
“No. He simply would not leave Arsenal. He claimed on talkSPORT that Arsenal will decline.
It would be difficult for any side to decline such a world-record payment. Paul Merson believes Liverpool should pursue Saka if they decide to accept the offer since they would have their pick of the majority of forwards in the world.
The expert went on to suggest that there is no one they want to replace him with.
“Of course every player has a bounty on his head, but for £150m I don’t see Arsenal wanting to sell because who are you going to replace him with?” Added urgently.
Saka and Salah at the moment are very similar. The Arsenal player scored 14 Premier League goals and provided 11 assists last season for the second-placed side in the Championship.
While Salah has scored 19 goals and provided 12 assists, he is 9 years older than Saka, only 22 years old. The fact that the Gunners star has come very close to the level of Liverpool’s main player shows a lot of promise, which will increase over the years.
So Bent might be right to say that there is no one else in this category but these two players, and even if Arsenal receive a huge sum of money, they will have no one to spend it on.
The pundit reiterates how important Saka is to Arsenal’s project as they want to go one step further from last season’s second place finished
Bent added: “I don’t think they will, not in the way that Arsenal are trying to go through this season. I can’t see that.”
Liverpool are not likely to sell Salah without knowing for definite they’ll be able to snare a direct replacement, but if there’s nobody else Arsenal could go for, that would be the same for Liverpool if they aren’t to budge on the Saka sale.
