Arsenal seek out Dortmund's Sokratis Papastathopoulos

It is likely that whoever steps in to fill Arsene Wenger's shoes for the top job at Arsenal will have limited funds to sign players, making Freiburg's £35million asking price for Soyuncu a concern.

Papastathopoulos would cost almost half of that, at £17.5million, and is already known to Arsenal's head of recruitment, Sven Mislintat, with whom he spent time with during their Dortmund days.

The Gunners are in need of a centre-back, having lost Laurent Koscielny out to injury for six months and Per Mertesacker having retired from his professional playing career.