Newcastle manager Alan Pardew has revealed that left-back José Enrique is refusing to sign a new contract because he wants to move to a bigger club that play in the Champions League. Newcastle have offered the Spaniard a record-breaking contract, but he is refusing to play ball. Liverpool were thought to be close to signing Enrique, but Pardew’s comments would suggest that a move to Arsenal is now more likely:

“The noises coming out of Jose’s camp are that he wants to get a new club playing Champions League football.

“Unfortunately we can’t offer him that but that seems to be his focus.

“Hopefully that will change but we’ve offered him a massive contract which he does not want to sign, so it’s a difficult position.

“There have been no concrete offers. But if he goes, it is going to leave a big hole in the team. It would need filling quickly.”

Whether or not Arsenal are in desperate need of a new left-back remains to be seen. On the one hand, we have lost Gaël Clichy to Manchester City. Clichy would be a difficult player for any club to replace. On the other hand, Arsène Wenger normally refuses to buy new players if he thinks that we have younger players within our ranks who are able to fill the void when players depart. As things stand, we have Kieran Gibbs who is eager to earn his keep and Armand Traoré has returned from a season-long loan at Juventus. We most not forget that Thomas Vermaelen is also a very capable left back.

In my opinion, we are still short of at least one defender. If Wenger trusts Gibbs and Traoré then he will probably buy a new centre-back; we can use Vermaelen at left-back if Gibbs and Traoré are really struggling. If Wenger thinks that Gibbs and Traoré are not quite ready, he will have to buy a new left-back to replace Clichy. He may even decide to buy both a new left-back and centre-back, but this is quite unlikely.

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