Arsene Wenger: Paul Pogba to Manchester United 'ticks all the boxes'

By Daniel Lewis, Senior Reporter | 10 August 2016

Arsene Wenger laments the growing sums of money English clubs are forced to hand over for players, but admits that Man United have got a star player in Paul Pogba.

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has said that he can understand why rivals Manchester United splashed out a world-record fee to sign Paul Pogba from Juventus.

The Red Devils finally got an £89m deal over the line this week to land the France international, who left Old Trafford for a minimal figure four years ago.

Wenger was among those to initially question the "crazy" sum of money United were prepared to offer to sign their former player, but has now conceded that the changing face of the English game means value for money is harder to come by.

"The value of a player is dependent on his talent, the expected strengthening of the team, his age and of course his resale value," Wenger told Sky Sports News. "When you speak about Pogba, it ticks all these boxes - but we are in a system that we don't master. We have to follow the prices paid by other people.

"That has gone up because the availability of money is much higher. That's why we may have crossed the £100m bar for the first time. It makes the market more unpredictable," he said. "Where you could approximately value a player before, today the identity of a club that comes in for a transfer is more important than the rest.

"If you go to Spain and you're an English club - straight away the inflation comes in. So I would say, in France the clubs, amongst themselves, are very reasonable. If an English club comes in, the price goes straight away up because they know there is money in England."

Wenger has spent a little over £30m this summer to bring in his own new recruits, with Rob Holding joining from Bolton Wanderers and Granit Xhaka swapping Borussia Monchengladbach for the Emirates Stadium.