Arsene Wenger has £70m to spend in the summer

Stevan Jovetic is fast emerging as Arsenal’s No 1 summer transfer target, with the Gunners prepared to smash their transfer record to sign the Fiorentina striker.
The Montenegro international has been on Arsene Wenger’s radar for 18 months, with scouts making regular checks on the 23-year-old.

    Arsene Wenger wants Stevan Jovetic to spearhead his side next season

  Olivier Giroud (centre) was one of a few players Wenger got his scouts to concentrate on

 

But the Frenchman has intensified his interest in the forward, requesting weekly scouting reports from Italian scouts.The move is viewed as a hugely significant within the club’s London Colney HQ, with all indications pointing to Jovetic being identified as the man Wenger - and his influential chief scout Steve Rowley - want to spearhead Arsenal’s attack next season.

Wenger made a similar request to his scouts for Lukas Podolski, Olivier Giroud and Gervinho.Wenger knows Jovetic won’t come cheaply, with Fiorentina unlikely to entertain any offers below £20million - which would eclipse the club’s current transfer record of the £15million paid to Zenit St Petersburg for Andrey Arshavin.But the Frenchman, who has a £70million transfer budget, is willing to go over Fiorentina’s valuation to land Jovetic.That may change, however, if the Gunners fail to qualify for the Champions League, with Wenger’s warchest due to be cut if they drop out of Europe’s elite competition.

Furthermore, Jovetic is unlikely to consider a switch to the Emirates Stadium without the prospect of playing Champions League football.Jovetic will be an integral piece in Wenger’s summer blueprint.But whether Thomas Vermaelen and Wojciech Szczesny continue to play such an integral role for Wenger next season remains to be seen.

                                  

                                  

 Wojciech Szczesny and Thomas Vermaelen were dropped for the Bayern Munich clash

Jovetic: Vital statistics

Partizan (06-08) 13 goals in 51 apps
Fiorentina (08-13) 34 goals in 108 apps
Montenegro (07-13) 10 goals in 21 apps

The pair paid the price for their recent poor form as they were dropped for the Champions League clash against Bayern Munich in midweek.
The decision to axe Vermaelen seems particularly telling given he is club captain.
But Wenger said: ‘I don’t believe leaving Vermaelen out undermines his captaincy.

                             Arsene Wenger has £70m to spend in the summer

‘I believe there’s two things. One who is a captain and a leader and that shouldn’t guarantee you a place in any game.‘I understand the captain is of massive importance in England. For purely sporting reasons, or tactical reasons in the game when you don’t think it is the right selection, do you put the player in just as he is captain? That is disrespectful to the guy who doesn’t play.’ Vermaelen and Szczesny are both set to miss out again for the visit to Swansea, with Wenger likely to keep faith with Lukasz Fabianski and Laurent Koscielny, who both excelled in the Allianz Arena.And Wenger added: ‘Everybody faces the same competition, including the players who [have] come in and been on the bench for a long time.