The Bender twins - Lars, of Bayer Leverkusen, and Sven, of Borussia Dortmund - are good at soccer. They're both midfielders of the defensive or holding variety, and either one would be nice to have at Arsenal. It's something I think we all agree would be helpful. And it appears that Arsenal agree, according to a report from German paper Express.de.
Allegedly the club have tabled a bid of €23 million (about £19.6 million) for Lars Bender, which Leverkusen have declined. This was Arsenal's second bid. Leverkusen just sold two of their better players, including Andre Schurrle to Chelsea, so that's not all that surprising. They don't really need the money at the moment, and they won't want to wholly dismantle the team all at once. If we're going to end up with a Bender, it's probably going to end up costing a bit more money than this.
That bid mentioned was a pretty big one, so if another one comes in and is actually a significant increase on it, I'd honestly be a bit surprised. I wouldn't bet that Arsenal would spend much more than £20 million on a player like Bender and because of that, I doubt this move is going to persist. I hope it does, because I like the player, but this one may be more realistic for the future - and that's a possibility, as Lars' contract has several more years left.
RELATED: STREAM - Arsenal target Higuain | Open Transfer Thread II