Crystal Palace have agreed a fee for Arsenal striker Eddie Nketiah. The player is set to have his medical ahead of the move across London.
With the transfer window closing shortly, teams across England are trying to secure deals for players.
One player who is nearing a move away is Arsenal academy graduate Nketiah. The forward looks set to make the short trip across London to sign for Crystal Palace after a deal was agreed between the two clubs.
What do we know about the Nketiah deal?
Fabrizio Romano confirmed that Palace have agreed a £25million plus £5million in add-ons for the attacker. Arsenal have also included a sell-on clause as part of the deal to sell Nketiah to Palace.
Nketiah is now expected to have his medical with Palace as they look to get the deal over the line well before the end of the Premier League transfer window.
How has Nketiah done for Arsenal?
Since joining Arsenal’s academy from Chelsea at the age of 14, Nketiah has progressed through the Gunners youth ranks to the first team. He broke into the first team back in 2017 and gone on to score 38 goals in 168 games for Arsenal.
However, despite Arsenal’s lack of strikers in recent years, Nketiah has found it hard to cement a starting spot.
He spent the second half of the 2019/20 season on loan at Leeds United. For the Yorkshire side, he scored five goals in 19 games before returning to London to fight for his spot in the Arsenal team.
Is this a good move for the player and club? – opinion
Nketiah is now 25 years old and is likely to be desperate to be playing more regularly. It looks like that won’t happen at Arsenal, so a move now might be the best option for his career.
He’ll have seen fellow Arsenal academy graduate Emile Smith-Rowe make the move to Fulham this summer and make an immediate impact. Nketiah could easily go and do the same at Palace this season.
For Palace, they’ve got already two good attacking options in Jean-Philippe Mateta and Odsonne Édouard. If Nketiah is incoming, you’d expect one of these two to depart as Nketiah will likely have made certain promises about minutes this season.
If they can get Nketiah scoring, they’ll have themselves a real diamond with plenty of time left in his career.