The defender admits the Gunners were looking forward to Suarez signing.
Per Mertesacker has revealed that the Arsenal players were ready for Liverpool superstar Luis Suarez to join the club in the summer.
Suarez was the subject of a £40m plus one pound bid from the Gunners as they tried to activate a buyout clause that turned out not to exist.
As a result of that offer relations between the two Premier League outfits broke down and the Uruguay international stayed at Anfield – and has been in brilliant form since, scoring 23 league goals in just 19 games.
However, Mertesacker says that the players at the Emirates Stadium were looking forward to Suarez arriving in north London.
“He is just a pure striker and that is what comes out after the transfer requests and him saying: ‘It’s better for me to leave because I want to play Champions League,'” the 29-year-old told the Guardian.
“When we heard that Arsenal might be interested in him, obviously we were up for it and we thought, ‘Yeah, he would fit in.'”
In the end Arsene Wenger decided to make a club record move for Mesut Ozil instead and signed the attacking midfielder from Real Madrid for £42.4m,
Although there have been critics of the Germany international the 25-year-old has certainly lifted the club in many ways.
However, their strike force – which consists of Olivier Giroud, Nicklas Bendtner and Lukas Podolski – is still said to be weak and the introduction of Suarez would have made their chances of winning silverware for the first time since 2005 much more credible.
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