Thomas Varmaelen is Arsenal's new centre back

Arsene Wenger may have promised the Arsenal fans a new defender this summer (after Carl Jenkinson’s arrival I might add), but it seems that the return of Thomas Vermaelen (and maybe the departure of Gael Clichy!) is enough for Wenger to believe that the defence has been improved enough.

Wenger hasn’t seemed such a happy figure in his press conferences lately and when he was asked if Arrsenal were still going to sign a new centre-back, he went into a ramble about how the club was searching high and low but EVERYONE ELSE was also looking…….

“We have specialised people who work everywhere.” he said. “Every club looks for centre-backs in the whole world,”.

“People with unlimited resources look for a centre-back. We are not in a supermarket where you go to a shelf and you ask ‘where are the centre-backs or the strikers?’

“We are today in an international market where all over the world people look for the same players.”

Then he said a strange thing that makes it sound like they come to Arsenal if they can’t find better players anywhere else.

“Massive clubs have scouts all over the world and if they don’t find anyone, in the end they come to us.

“You don’t need to be a genius to understand that.” (Maybe a complaint against Man City, but what has it to do with centre-backs?)

But then Wenger said he had no intention of buying a new centre-back just for the sake of it, especially now that Vermaelen has returned to the squad.

“We will have a new centre-back by the end of the transfer window because Thomas Vermaelen only played five games last year. To buy just for the sake of buying – you won’t find me there.

“If I’m convinced the player has the quality, I will always do it if he’s better than the players we have.”

So now I’m very confused. Is he looking or isn’t he? Because if he IS, then I could name you TEN centre-backs better than Squillaci without doing a search……