Wenger confirms Gallas interest

14 April 2012

Arsene Wenger believes William Gallas would fit right in at Arsenal - and accepts his squad will seem "a bit light" should Ashley Cole leave and nobody replace the England defender when the transfer window shuts.

The future of left-back Cole remains uncertain despite his clear desire to leave and Wenger's willingness to let the 25-year-old go. Talks between Arsenal and Chelsea have seemingly hit an impasse over the size of the transfer fee.

Wenger said: "I like the fact he (Gallas) is a good defender. He can play right-back, left-back, centre-back. We want the player because we made an offer for him. That is clear."

However, the Arsenal manager stressed: "We have not spoken to the player yet. You need to agree personal terms. We have a salary cap here and he comes from a club with no salary cap.

"I do not know if it is possible to agree personal terms and agree with Chelsea.

"If he comes here, frankly, he will have to come for less money.

"We can make one exception [Thierry Henry] - but we cannot make five or six."

Wenger would not be drawn into whether he would be open to any swap deal involving the pair - and insisted: "Gallas is not the only player we have a chance of getting.

"As you know there is always a lot happening in the last few days - but he is a player we have a chance to get.

"He wants to leave Chelsea, Ashley Cole wants to leave us."

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in