Thomas Lemar will join Arsenal, transfer deal is ‘done’ - Emanuele Giulianelli

Journalist Giulianelli has made a number of big transfer claims in the past to mixed success - and his latest one has been to suggest a move for Lemar, 21, is a ‘done’ deal.

Giulianelli claims the move will then be completed once Monaco have found a replacement.

He tweeted: “To all the Arsenal supporters asking me about Lemar I can answer: don't worry, he will join the Gunners.”

It prompted one fan to tweet: “Ema, one quick question, please: is Lemar to #AFC conditional upon anything else? Or 100% agreed, nothing to do with any Monaco signing?”

Giulianelli replied: “Done, but Monaco want to have a substitute first.”

Arsene Wenger yesterday insisted Arsenal are still ‘active’ in the transfer market.

He said: “I believe there are actually two ways to improve the team. First of all to improve the quality of what we do in training to improve the squad and improve the players we have, and secondly to bring more top-level players in.

“The difficulty is to bring top-level players in because you pay a huge amount of money for very normal players at the moment. As well, all the big clubs are chasing the same players and that provokes huge inflation.

“Maybe this will be the first time we [football clubs] pay over £200m, maybe over £300m with Neymar and around £200m with Mbappe.

“So there is a huge inflation. But we are active, we are working hard and I think we have done well with Kolasinac, we have done well with Lacazette and we are continuing to work.

“There’s the usual acceleration in the final part of August.

“But I think you have always to be on alert every day, because a good opportunity might turn up.

“Sometimes people you are after for a long time are not available and suddenly they become available. So you have always to be on alert. That’s what we do.”