Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta is keen on bringing Alejandro Balde from Barcelona to the Emirates Stadium in the summer transfer window, according to a Spanish report.

Riccardo Calafiori and Myles Lewis-Skelly are the two recognised left-backs in the Arsenalsquad at the moment, while Piero Hincapie is also adept at playing in that role despite being a central defender by trade.

Arsenal plan to make Hincapie’s loan deal from Bayer Leverkusen permanent and do not want to sell Calafiori this summer, according to our friends at TEAMtalk.

Lewis-Skelly, though, could leave Arsenal this summer,with the 19-year-old left-back having started just one Premier League game all season.

There is no immediate need for Arsenal to sign a left-back, but a speculative report in the Spanish media has claimed Arteta’s interest in Alejandro Balde.

The 22-year-old Spain international left-back came through La Masia and has established himself in the first-team squad at Barcelona.

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Balde has scored three goals and given 21 assists in 160 matches in all competitions for Barcelona so far in his career.

While Balde has made 18 starts in LaLiga and six starts in the Champions League for Barcelona so far this season, he is on the sidelines at the moment with a hamstring injury and will not be fit until the start of April.

Barcelona manager Hansi Flick has been playing Joao Cancelo at left-back, and the former Manchester City star has impressed.

According to a Spanish report, Arsenal manager ‘Mikel Artetahas taken an interest’ in Balde.

Balde’s ‘irregular performances?and defensive errors’ have seen Flick prefer Cancelo even when the Spaniard was fit.

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Barcelona president Joao Laporta and sporting director Deco ‘are not satisfied with the progression he has shown in recent years’, and last season’s LaLiga winners could sell him ‘if they receive an acceptable offer’.

The report added: ‘They are already studying a list of possible successors, and they consider that it could be an interesting sacrifice, and not excessively painful.’

It continued: ‘This is where Arsenal have appeared, who would be very interested in signing Balde.

‘It is not the first time that this possibility has been speculated, and, in the past, Arteta has already contacted the pearl raised at La Masia to try to convince him to land in London.

‘At that time, he was not lucky,?but now he would hope to be able to achieve his goal, seeing the ambitious project that the English team has, and also, its economic potential.’

Arsenal could offer €55million (￡47.5m) for Balde, states the report, but one has to question why the Premier League leaders would spend that much on a player they do not need.

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