Arsenal signed the former West Ham United midfielder Declan Rice during the summer transfer window.
The Gunners spent a fee of around £105 million for the 24-year-old England international and Pep Guardiola has now revealed that Manchester City wanted to sign the player as well. A report from 90 min claims that Manchester City had a £90 million bid rejected for the defensive midfielder and Arsenal won the race for his signature eventually.
Guardiola has now revealed that Manchester City were not able to afford West Ham’s asking price for the England international. Rice has established himself as one of the best defensive midfielders in the league and he was outstanding for West Ham last season.
The 24-year-old helped them win the UEFA Europa Conference league and he was expected to leave the Hammers at the end of the season. The player will now look to take the next step in his career with the move to Arsenal.
The Gunners needed to bring in a quality defensive midfielder earlier this summer and Declan Rice should prove to be a quality long-term acquisition for them.
Although Arsenal paid over the odds for the England international midfielder, Rice should be able to justify the investment in the long run.
Meanwhile, Pep Guardiola has revealed that Manchester City prioritised the signing of Josko Gvardiol who joined the Premier League champions for a fee of around £77.6 million.
The fact that they paid a substantial amount of money to sign the talented young Croatian defender restricted their resources and they were not able to match Arsenal’s efforts to land Rice.
“Everyone knows we wanted him. We could play him when Rodri could not play. But in the end, Arsenal pushed more, wanted him or maybe Mikel was more convincing than me, or the club itself. The offer they got we could not reach it because we thought about Josko Gvardiol in that position and we could not afford to pay that much. That is why.”
Manchester City ended up signing the likes of Mateo Kovacic and Matheus Nunes instead.
It will be interesting to see if they can bring in a quality defensive midfielder in the coming months. The Premier League giants currently have Rodri and Kalvin Phillips operating in a similar role to that of Rice.
