Evening all. A couple of bits of transfer news to begin with today. Firstly, a report on Kingfut.com, a website specializing in Egyptian football, claims Mohamed Elneny will travel to London tomorrow to finally, at long, long last, complete his move to Arsenal.

They say the midfielder had no problem obtaining a work permit and the hold up was over a visa, which has now been secured. I must admit this confused me a little, as I thought they were basically the same thing. So I checked online and according to workpermit.com, the permit is required by the club, and the visa by the player:

A UK Work Permit is a document issued by Work Permits (UK), a part of the Department for Education and Employment; it gives your employer permission to employ you in a specific job at a specific location.

A UK Work Permit is not a permission for you to take up work in the UK. The permission for you to enter and work in the UK is conferred by a UK Immigration or Consular officer who, following the issue of a Work Permit, may issue you with a suitable visa. The visa is an endorsement stamped in your passport.

Even if you are already working in the UK on a Work Permit, if you want to move to another job, your new (prospective) employer must obtain a new Work Permit before you can change jobs.

I’m glad that’s cleared up. The second story of the day involving potential Arsenal signings concerns two teenage Nigerian players who helped their country win the FIFA U-17 World Cup in Chile last year.

Some reports today claim Arsenal have beaten off a host of Europe’s top clubs in securing the services of Kelechi Nwakali, 17 and Samuel Chukwueze, 16, who play for Diamond Football Academy in Umuahia, southeastern Nigeria. But the Guardian say Manchester City are still in the hunt for the pair, whilst the The Times suggest Arsene Wenger is ‘close to beating Bayern for the wonder kids’ from Nigeria. Make up your minds …

Speaking of transfers, the boss explained at his pre-Liverpool press conference yesterday why he believes ‘many’ Premier League clubs will have a busy window this month, saying:

I would say for the media you could have some good news [with the] January transfer window. I believe many clubs will be active. You go from the clubs who are down in the table like Villa, who have to do something, to the clubs at the top. I’m sure many of them could be very active. My prediction is that it could be one of the most active transfer windows in January that you have seen. At the bottom and at the top, everyone thinks they have a responsibility to do something because we have a chance if we do improve our squad. At the bottom, especially with the new TV deal coming in, the teams who fear to go down will be under pressure not to accept the situation. We have seen in the past that teams who have responded well in January were successful sometimes.

As far as we’re concerned, Arsene said he’d be busy this month so you have to think Elneny won’t be the only arrival in the first-team squad, especially with Mathieu Flamini and David Ospina being linked with moves away.

But aside from replacements for those two if we do let them leave this month, I think another central midfielder (in addition to Elneny) and a quality striker, if we can find one, are the two areas I’d like to see us strengthen. Let’s see what happens.

A short one today but I’l be back with a preview of the Liverpool game tomorrow.

Until then.