EXCLUSIVE: Medical BOOKED For Ezri Konsa! - BREAKING NEWS

Hi and welcome along to AFTV. I've got some exclusive news to bring to you. Whilst I've been driving actually, I've seen that David Ornstein has said that Arsenal are closing in on a deal to sign Esri Konsa. Well I can exclusively reveal that also a medical has been booked. This deal is nearing the closure and Esri Konsa, subject to the medical, will become an Arsenal player. Esri Konsa of course, a 28-year-old centre-back who plays for Aston Villa, had a fantastic season for them last year. Of course they won the Europa League, qualified for Europe as well and of course he was a mainstay for England at the World Cup. Well he is on the verge of signing for Arsenal. It looks like Arsenal have got their man, subject to this medical that has been booked in. Now to give you context of why we're looking for a centre-back, we've got this injury at the moment. Two injuries, even though we were hearing some good news yesterday via the BBC that Urien Timber could return back to training this week. But he hasn't had a pre-season and he's only going to be returning back to training. But the big one is of the injury to William Saliba. William Saliba, we know, has been carrying this back problem throughout last season. He did really, really well when you consider he had that problem. But he aggravated it at the World Cup. He was managing it through a lot of the World Cup, but in the World Cup, in the quarter-finals, he aggravated that injury and he's been out ever since. Now the talk is that he may not return back to full, you know, the full Arsenal squad until at least the end of October, November. He's in full rehabilitation for the back. He's got to give it a full rest. Luckily he didn't have to have an operation and Arsenal do not want to rush him back. They want this guy to get the full rehabilitation so that when he does come back, he comes back 100% firing. And of course, remember, he wouldn't have had any pre-season. So Arsenal have been looking for a centre-back that basically can come in and is going to be what we call a plug-and-play player. A player that's been there, done that, knows the terrain and they identified Esri Konta as that player. And they've been trying to get this deal done for a little while. We were being told that the original offer that Arsenal made, even though none of this was sort of, you know, put out there, but the original offer they made behind the scenes to try and sign Esri Konta was £30 million. Then we were told that Aston Villa were saying, no, if you want Esri Konta, number one, we don't want to sell him because he's a very important player for us. But number two, if you do want him, we want £60 million. And that has been the sticking point for this. But it does look like a compromise now has been made. There was the chief executive or former chief executive of Aston Villa, who yesterday on a podcast said that he was told that Esri Konta would be signing for Arsenal next week for around about £50 million. Well, it looks like he was telling the truth because the medical has now been booked and Arsenal are closing in on the deal to get this done for Esri Konta. I'm not sure of the amount of what the deal is going to be done. But what I am being told is that that medical has been booked in and Esri Konta will become an Arsenal player. And listen, I think this is going to be an excellent signing. I think this is an essential signing, even though we've got Christian Mosquera, who done brilliantly, you know, when he came in in the community shield for, you know, against Haaland, he was superb. But you don't want to leave yourself light in those positions. Both Ben White and Timba have had injury issues and now Saliba. It could be that maybe sometimes Mosquera shifted over to play on the right hand side and Konta plays a centre back. Or you can play Mosquera at a centre back and you can move Konta over onto that right hand side. And what you have in Esri Konta is an experienced Premier League ready international player. He's been there and done that in the Premier League. He has. He's been brilliant in the Premier League. So he's not going to have to get used to playing in this league. He's played in the league, you know, for all these years now. He knows the league inside out. He's experienced and he's a ball playing centre back. He can play right back. He can play centre back. You know, he fits what Arsenal are doing perfectly. And he also has experience of playing in the Champions League. He has experience of playing in the Europa League. Of course, they won the final last year and he has experience of playing at the very highest level at the World Cup. So I think this represents a really, really good signing. You know, I mean, he's experienced with his age as well, being the age of 28. Obviously, Arsenal are going to have to pay over the odds for him. You know, their valuation of probably around about £30 million might have been slightly lower. I'd say he'd probably be on the £40 million bracket. But he's one of Aston Villa's main guys and they wouldn't have wanted to sell him. But he wants to come to Arsenal. We've been told this for quite a while, that he really, really wanted to come to Arsenal. It was even talked that he was speaking to the Arsenal England international players at the World Cup and asking them a lot of stuff about Arsenal. And now it looks like he's on his way. I remember I saw Esri Konca last year. I was at an event and he was there and he actually said to me, and this was quite early in the season, he actually said to me, he goes, I think Arsenal are going to win the league. He goes, you guys have got a really, really good side and I think you're going to win the league. He told me that early and how ironic now that he's actually going to be an Arsenal player. And me for one, I'm pleased with his signing. I think we needed to make this, listen, if we didn't have this long-term injury to William Saliba, it wouldn't be essential. But I am pleased with this signing. The only thing I'm thinking about this signing is, is this going to mean that we may lose Ben White? Because there's also been rumours linking Ben White with a move to Everton. Strong rumours. Now, does the fact that Esri Konca is coming in means that Ben White might be leaving? I hope not. Because again, I think we could then be leaving ourself a little bit light on that right-hand side. Ben White was excellent in that game against Manchester City. Remember that block he put in is fantastic. I don't personally want to lose Ben White. I don't think we can afford to lose Ben White with the injuries to Timber and injuries we've got in that position. That's going to be an interesting one to watch if this Konca deal gets done. But let's wait and see how that works out. But once again, just to remind you that Esri Konca, exclusive here on AFTV, a medical has been booked in for him. It's looking like Esri Konca is going to become an Arsenal player. David Ornstein also reporting that Esri Konca is on a verge to move to Arsenal. That, you know, that it looks like, from what he's saying, that, you know, an agreement has been reached between the two sides. Well, I can go a little further than that and say a medical has been booked in and Esri Konca is set to become a Gooner. And I think this will be a great signing. And the signings so far this summer have been good. Can we get that left winger or forward player before the end of the transfer window? Two weeks to go. Let's see. Thanks for watching.