West Ham United midfield star Declan Rice reportedly admires the project going on at Arsenal under Mikel Arteta.
That’s according to CBS journalist Ben Jacobs who told Curtis Shaw TV how the feelings between Rice and Arsenal are very much mutual.
The 23-year-old Hammers star is the most important player at the London Stadium, but with his contract set to expire in the summer of 2025, David Moyes may well be forced into selling him in the summer of 2023.
Arsenal are apparently one of the clubs interested in signing the England International at the end of this season (The Daily Mail and The Sun).
The likes of Liverpool and Chelsea want to acquire Rice’s signature as well.
I feel like most West Ham fans have accepted the inevitable – that Dec will leave the London Stadium at the end of the season.
However, Arsenal’s interest in signing him has seemingly come out of nowhere, and would be a move for Rice that nobody would have predicted last year…
Declan Rice ‘admires’ Arsenal in hammer blow for West Ham
It seems as though Dec could be Emirates bound in the summer transfer window.
CBS journalist Ben Jacobs has told Curtis Shaw TV how Rice ‘admires’ the Arsenal project:
Declan Rice really admires Arsenal and what they are doing at the moment and the feeling is quite mutual. So there’s nothing advanced on the Arsenal end but they don’t really need to worry about entering the race just now, because it’s only going to take place during the summer. So I think it’s one to watch after the window shuts. There’s definitely some substance in the links.
We have to take what Jacobs says seriously. After all, he was the first one to break West Ham’s interest in signing Lucas Paqueta from Lyon in the summer.
Labelled as an unbelievable player by Teddy Sheringham (Daily Mail), Rice has absolutely everything needed to go on and become a truly world-class player – if he isn’t one already.
Losing Rice will be a massive blow for West Ham, but the important thing for David Moyes is that he already has a succession plan in place. That will most likely include the signings of two top-class central midfielders, because there is no way that we will be able to attract a player of Rice’s calibre to the London Stadium in the summer.
It’s just a case now of where Dec will end up playing next season and beyond.
Declan Rice reportedly admirers Arsenal, and that means that a move to the Gunners seems like a fairly realistic outcome.
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