Bruno Guimaraes Heads to Spain Amid Arsenal Speculation
Bruno Guimaraes is heading for Spain – but not, for now, to seal the Arsenal move many expected.
The Newcastle captain is flying out to join the club’s pre-season camp in La Manga, despite strong reports that he was set for an Arsenal medical on Monday as part of an £80million switch.
On Sunday, the narrative looked clear: the Brazil midfielder was said to be closing in on a move to the Emirates, the medical viewed as the final step. By Monday morning, the picture had changed. Sky Sports reported that Guimaraes was instead en route to link up with his current teammates.
According to The Chronicle, Guimaraes left Brazil for Spain on a commercial flight on Sunday night, a plan agreed with Newcastle. He is understood to have informed the club in July of his desire to join Arsenal, but for now he remains very much a Newcastle player, and his next conversation is not with club doctors in London but with Matthias Jaissle in La Manga.
Jaissle, in Spain with the squad while his official confirmation as Eddie Howe’s successor is delayed by paperwork, is expected to hold talks with his captain over the midfielder’s future. Those discussions will go a long way to deciding whether Newcastle’s summer is built around Guimaraes or built around replacing him.
The club had already begun bracing for the latter scenario. Newcastle have been linked with several possible successors to their influential skipper, including Inter Milan and Croatia midfielder Petar Sucic, as recruitment chiefs quietly sketched out a midfield without its driving force.
For Arsenal, Guimaraes is not the only Brazilian at the heart of a complicated pursuit.
The midfielder’s return to Newcastle training on Monday mirrors that of Brazil team-mate and fellow Arsenal target Vinicius Jr, whose own situation carries its own layer of intrigue. Arsenal are preparing an ambitious move for the Real Madrid forward, who is locked in a contract stand-off with less than 12 months remaining on his current deal.
Any sense that Madrid might blink early, though, met a firm response. After Real’s 2-2 friendly draw with Fiorentina in Austria on Saturday, Jose Mourinho confirmed that Vinicius Jr would report back for training on Monday as scheduled, alongside Brahim Diaz and new signing Bernardo Silva. The Brazilian did exactly that, pictured arriving at the Valdebebas complex as Madrid’s preparations rolled on with him still at the centre of their plans.
So Arsenal watch and wait. Two primary targets, two players back in training with their current clubs, two negotiations that promise to test both patience and financial muscle.
Mikel Arteta’s side, defending Premier League champions, have so far added only two faces this summer. Greek winger Christos Tzolis has arrived from Club Brugge in a £34million deal, while Illan Meslier has joined on a free after leaving Leeds to bolster the goalkeeping department.
Useful business, but not transformative on its own. Not the kind of business that changes a title race.
That, in Arsenal’s eyes, is what Guimaraes and Vinicius Jr could do. For now, though, one is boarding a flight to La Manga, the other walking into Valdebebas. And until someone blinks, the most decisive moves of Arsenal’s summer are happening somewhere else.
