Arsenal demands halted Inter Mustafi interest

Inter Milan director Piero Ausilio has said that his side opted out of a deal for the German defender because the Gunners set the bar too high on the transfer fee.

The Serie A side offered a £4.6m loan fee with an option to buy for £23m but Arsenal favoured a permanent deal and were holding out for a fee in the region of the £35m which they paid for him last summer.

Arsene Wenger had hoped for a summer of spending to invest in the squad, but the club only spent £52.7m on Alexandre Lacazette and recouped £70.5m in sales to offset the spending, so Arsenal made a net profit of £17.8m.

However, Inter turned away from the potential deal so Mustafi did not join Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain (£40m), Wojciech Szczesny (£13.5m), Gabriel (£10m), and Kieran Gibbs (£7m) in leaving the Emirates stadium this summer.

"The negotiations we really entered into for a centre-back was Shkodran Mustafi, but when we saw his club's demands, we let it go," Inter's director Ausilio said. 

The 25-year-old, who has made one appearance so far this season, only joined last summer from Valencia but Arsene Wenger was willing to let him go. 

Mustafi will now have to remain at Arsenal until at least January, where he will be competing with Laurent Koscielny, Per Mertesacker and Rob Holding for a place at centre-back.