Gunners Open Dann Talks And Arsenal Keen To Bring Birmingham Defender To Emirates

Sky Sports News understands Arsenal have opened preliminary talks with Birmingham over a possible move for defender Scott Dann AND he is widely expected to leave St Andrews during the transfer window in the wake of the Blues' relegation from the top-flight in the final day of the last season.

The imposing centre-back formed an impressive partnership with Roger Johnson before an untimely injury in a January curtailed his the campaign and contributed to a club's eventual demotion and gunners boss Arsene Wenger is known to be a keen to strengthen his defence having seen their hopes of silverware undermined last season by deficiencies at a back.

Emirates Stadium outfit have held initial discussions with the St Andrews club over bringing the 24-year-old to North London and the host of Premier League clubs, including Chelsea, Liverpool, Aston Villa and the Stoke have all been linked with the former Walsall and Coventry man this summer.

Now appears that Arsenal have jumped to a head of the queue for the player who moved to Birmingham in a £3.5million deal in the summer of 2009 Wenger is likely to have funds to invest in a transfer market with captain Cesc Fabregas expected to a complete for his multi-million pound return to Barcelona in a coming days.

Arsenal and France international defender Gael Clichy is undergoing a medical at Manchester City and he has been a regular in the Arsenal defence in recent seasons.

The 25-year-old full-back who joined the Gunners from French club Cannes in 2003, is out of the contract at a Emirates Stadium next summer and he has reportedly told Arsenal he wanted to leave last month, and had been linked with Liverpool and Roma.
The City are rivals for his signature, with the deal reportedly worth £7m and the arsenal boss Arsene Wenger faces an anxious time with playmaker Cesc Fabregas again being linked with Barcelona and the Midfielder Sami Nasri has also been tipped to leave the club, and is thought to be a target for both City and Manchester United.

The Gunners, who return for pre-season training this week ahead of a tour of Malaysia and China, have been strongly linked with a move for Bolton defender Gary Cahill and Wenger recently claimed that it will be late into pre-season before there is significant movement in the transfer market and the We are in a waiting period, everybody is waiting, said the Arsenal boss in an interview with Alsace TV.

International career for Gael Clichy has earned caps with all of France's youth teams for which he was eligible and he was a late participant at under 15 level under coach Luc Rabat and he made his youth international debut on 13 March 2001 in a 3–0 friendly win over Italy.

Clichy appeared in 10 matches as France attempted to qualify for the 2002 UEFA European Under 17 Football Championship and he made his debut with the team on 19 September 2001 in its opening league match of the season for a 1–0 win over Yugoslavia  for a qualifying for the UEFA-sanctioned tournament.