According to Fabrizio Romano, Monaco have opened negotiations with Sturm Graz as they look to recruit ex-Arsenal striker Mika Biereth in January/
The Denmark under-21 international left the Gunners last summer in a £4 million deal after firing the Austrian side to a domestic double during an initial six-month loan spell.
Biereth has carried his fine scoring form into the new campaign netting 14 times in 25 appearances leading Europe’s bigger clubs to take notice.
🚨🔴⚪️ EXCLUSIVE: AS Monaco agree personal terms with Mika Biereth as fav option for striker position!
21 year old striker wants Monaco, talks underway between clubs with Sturm Graz to agree on fee.
Former #AFC striker has agreed to the move… Monaco are on it. pic.twitter.com/TeRSGt5vMK
— Fabrizio Romano (@FabrizioRomano) January 2, 2025
It’s unclear what kind of fee Monaco are ready to pay Strum Graz, but the Gunners will be entitled to a slice of the action having included a sell-on clause when the striker departed in July. Biereth signed for the Gunners from Fulham in 2021 and also undertook loan spells with RKC Waalwijk and Motherwell before landing in Austria.
Interestingly, a move to the Stade Louis II would see Biereth reunited with Arsenal Academy teammate Folarin Balogun – the pair played regularly together in Premier League 2 but found first-team opportunities had to come by.
Balogun, now a fully fledged USA international, completed a £34 million move to Monaco in 2023 after a successful season-long loan with Stade de Reims.
The move looks set. Let’s hope it’s a big one!
I imagine it’ll be around the £15-20m mark.
Rasmus went to Atalanta for €20m from Sturm Graz and they have similar profiles / goalscoring records.
Not sure how big our slice of the pie is but guessing around 25-40%.
So yeah, not life changing money but a good little earner on top of the £4m already earned.
Just a shame we can’t have a double sell on clause. Because if Biereth bangs at Monaco, he’ll be worth £60-£80m in a market which is devoid of CF options.
Devoid is not how I would describe it. Looking around England, you can see plenty of promise in Liam Delap and Evan Ferguson, and, sticking with Brighton, Joao Pedro; then there’s Cunha or Mbuemo if you like more subtlety, or Anthony Gordon and Isak of course; Jhon Duran has been pretty good too. That’s just in our league from “smaller” clubs who would probably sell for the right price. There’s a whole market on the continent too. I think we over value our own sometimes because we aren’t really tuned in to what’s going on elsewhere.
still don’t fully understand why we couldn’t have kept him, could’ve been really nice someone with his profile in the squad backing up Jesus and Kai and I’m sure he would’ve gotten some games.
💯 this kid is going to be good and we let him go for basically nothing.
Just as Balogun was going to be good?
If a player is surrounded by good/great players, they automatically have more chance to succeed.
A lesser striker, Sanogo won FA Cup for Arsenal.
You shouldn’t keep guys who aren’t going to be able to play for you. Endless loans are not good for anyone. You keep the ones you know have the level, like Ethan and MLS. You sell the others. There’s a chance you may let a late bloomer slip but on the whole you make money and you set the players you sell up for success by giving them to a club that will play them, ideally platform them well too. It’s already working out for Biereth, and the club gets to double dip with the sell on clause. Other players… Read more »
I get that, and if we’d have managed to buy a striker I’d have been all for it, but given our lack of depth at that position and given his success last season in Austria I feel like he could’ve gotten a chance for at least half a season with us if not a full one, and I don’t think the income from his sale plus whatever small percentage sell on we get is going to supersede the not insignificant chance that he’d have helped us this season and/or impressed enough in the Carabao Cup and as a sub to… Read more »
I’ll be honest I’ve never seen anything in this player to convince me that he can play for a top club. He’s a big lad who can hit the ball well when he has time and space. At this point that’s it and thats enough at a certain level but it doesn’t come close to Arsenal’s level. Maybe he keeps evolving and becomes a better player into his mid 20s but Arsenal don’t have years to wait on him.
Really, and yet just think of the years we kept nkietah awarding him bigger and better contracts for what? Fck all and, surprise, now he can’t even get off the bench at palace…our decision making on who is “going to make it” and who needs to be moved on has not exactly been razor sharp last 5 years. The way this kid plays he could be the next haaland…let’s hope he’s not.
BTW £34 million for Balogun was a great bit of business…
If you think back to the endless debates on these forums about whether it should have been Balogun or Eddie we kept… I think we’re all now a lot more aware that it’s not about sentiment, it’s about selling at the right time and securing the best fee we can in cases where there isn’t virtual certainty they’re first teamers. That is going to result in some misses, where players do go on to do better things than we thought (Biereth being an example) but it avoids us getting ourselves in the AMN/Chambers etc scenarios where we’ve turned down big… Read more »
Yep, and I think we learned to make things even better both should have left 🙂
Can’t accuse Mikel of not giving Eddie a fair shake. Probably a little too much of a shake to be honest, but people seem to forget that when war drums are banged about young players not getting chances.
People often accuse us of being poor sellers. But we’ve sold really well with academy players over the years.
Willock, Iwobi, Smith Rowe and Nketiah all commanded fees of around £30m, as did Flo.
And even players like The Ox (35), Theo (20), and Alex Song (15) brought in substantial fees.
And you could even make an argument that Cesc at £35m was good business, given he cost nothing. But I’m not going to make that argument. Because his value was actually double that *hits forehead with open hand in remembrance*
Has Balogun been a success at Monaco?
See above!
Sorry thought you said Biereth, should have read it better!
Balogun 42 matches, 11 goals 8 assists for Monaco.
So far not really, but not a total disappointment either from what I gather, still more of a “wait and see” situation because he had to integrate into a completely new system and style of play and then has been injured this season. Still seems like it could go either way.
If I was him I’d want a move to MLS if it doesn’t work out in the long term. Being a USA international he could integrate more with his international teammates and he could really kill it for the right club in the right system out there.