Arsenal target Emil Forsberg has refused to play down speculation linking him with AC Milan, as the Gunners look set to miss out.
The 25-year-old is coming off the back of a great season with RB Leipzig, scoring eight goals and providing a staggering 22 assists in 30 Bundesliga appearances.
That in turn helped the club finish in a surprise second place in the league last year, with several key players earning plenty of interest from clubs around Europe.
Forsberg is certainly one of them, and although Milan can only offer Europa League, similarly to Arsenal, he doesn’t seem to be put off by that as he’s ultimately looking for a club that will help him go to the next level in his career.
“[Milan] is a fantastic, big club,” he told Expressen. “It is an interesting project, making investments and wanting to take back the throne again.
“[The Champions League] is not a major factor for me. In the end it’s only about football. I want to have an important role in the team, but I’ll see – my agent takes care of all that.”
The Swedish international is contracted to Leipzig until 2022 and has a price-tag of £20m, as per the The Sun, and so it won’t be cheap for either Arsenal or Milan to snap him up this summer.
However, based on these latest comments, it appears as though the latter are leading the race for now as Arsene Wenger could be forced to explore other options.
Milan have ambitious plans this summer, as following on from the takeover of the club by Yonghong Li, they have already signed Mateo Musacchio, Franck Kessie and Ricardo Rodriguez in a matter of weeks, and are expected to add several more new faces before the summer is over.