After a bit of a lull, the transfer market has sparked back into life this week.
Here are Tuesday’s signed and sealed moves, from Sunderland’s club-record signing – who could solve the Black Cats’ penalty woes – to a potential new £4.0m FPL defender.
Kepa Arrizabalaga (Chelsea to Arsenal, £5m)
The world’s most expensive goalkeeper is on the move again – but this time for just £5m.
While the Arsenal publicity machine generously says Kepa Arrizabalaga will “battle with [David Raya] for the sole goalkeeping spot” in north London, the ex-Chelsea man has basically crossed the capital to play understudy to his compatriot.
Kepa has fallen a long way from the young prospect who Chelsea signed for £71m in 2018 but there has been a career rebuild of sorts in the last few years.
His season-long loan at Bournemouth in 2024/25 was pretty much a success.
The Cherries registered their best-ever Premier League defensive record last season, while Kepa’s numbers were solid and Raya-esque.
| Save percentage (rank v other PL goalkeepers*) | xG prevented (rank v other PL goalkeepers*) | |
|---|---|---|
| Kepa Arrizabalaga | 72.4% (8th) | +2.1 (=4th) |
| David Raya | 71.7% (9th) | +2.0 (8th) |
*minimum 10 appearances
Arsenal’s capture of Kepa means that Bournemouth are now down three of last season’s first-choice back five as Milos Kerkez and Dean Huijsen have moved on for handsome fees.
Sebastiaan Bornauw (Wolfsburg to Leeds United, £5.1m)
We’d already name-checked Bornauw in our piece on the Leeds defence, as his capture was imminent at that point.
A physical, no-nonsense defender, he follows another ‘defence first’ centre-half, Jaka Bijol, in joining the newly promoted Whites. Hopefully, this bodes well for Leeds’ clean sheet prospects.
An average of 4.11 aerial duels won per 90 minutes in 2024/25 put him in the 99th percentile of his positional peers across Europe!
“I’m strong. I like duels and I think that’s pretty English. I think as a centre-back, I’m dangerous in front of the goal, I like set pieces, offensive set pieces. So that’s what I think my game is, I would say.” – Sebastiaan Bornauw
Set-piece threat certainly adds to his appeal, especially if he comes in at £4.0m as expected. He’s never quite matched the six-goal campaign at Koln in 2019/20 but he averaged an attempt every 98 minutes for Wolfsburg last season, which is very good for a centre-half (Gabriel Magalhaes‘ average at Arsenal was 103 minutes, for context).
The issue is that he might be back-up, at least initially, with Bijol and Joe Rodon taking the reins. One to keep an eye on in pre-season.
Zepiqueno Redmond (Feyenoord to Aston Villa, free)
Who, you might ask?
In short, likely one for the future.
The 19-year-old Dutch attacker has joined Villa from Feyenoord for free, following the expiry of his contract.
Redmond has only made four league appearances in his fledgling career, with the rookie fast-tracked to the Feyenoord first team in November 2024 amid an injury crisis up top. Another shortage of strikers in the spring even saw him start a UEFA Champions League tie against AC Milan in February of this year.
Both of his goals for the Dutch giants arrived in a cup win over MVV Maastricht in December.
He’s played across the frontline but more recently starred off the left flank against England in the UEFA European Under-19 Championship in June, scoring twice:
— backup (@backup1098754) June 20, 2025
Jorgen Strand Larsen (Celta Vigo to Wolverhampton Wanderers, £23m)
One to file under, “I thought he was already a Wolves player”.
In news to this author, Strand Larsen was actually only on loan at Molineux last year with an option to buy.
And buy him Wolves have, following a fine debut Premier League season in which he scored 14 goals. Not one of them was a penalty, either.
Above: Only five forwards scored more non-penalty goals than Strand Larsen last season
It’ll be interesting to see if he does indeed inherit spot-kicks now that Matheus Cunha has gone. The Norwegian has only taken three in his career, but has at least scored all of them.
Habib Diarra (Strasbourg to Sunderland, £30m)
An eye-catching, club-record transfer fee but probably not a player likely to court much Fantasy interest.
Diarra’s capture is quite the coup for Sunderland, who have reinvested the money from Jobe Bellingham‘s sale to Borussia Dortmund.
AC Milan, Eintracht Frankfurt and Leeds were apparently chasing the 21-year-old Diarra, whose entire career has been spent at Strasbourg so far.
And, on the surface, this looks like a transfer designed to directly replace the box-to-box Bellingham.
Strong at driving with the ball and progressive with his passing, Diarra will likely assume the all-action central midfield role that Bellingham has vacated.
It’s not a role that really produces attacking returns: Bellingham registered just four goals and three assists in the Championship last season.
That’s eerily similar to what Diarra delivered at Strasbourg:
| Season | Team | Starts (sub apps) | Goals | Assists |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024/2025 | Strasbourg | 27 (3) | 4 | 5 |
| 2023/2024 | Strasbourg | 28 (3) | 3 | 1 |
| 2022/2023 | Strasbourg | 18 (11) | 3 | 2 |
| 2021/2022 | Strasbourg | 1 (3) | 0 | 0 |
Diarra only averaged a shot every 87 minutes last season. His rate of chances created was identical. Those are not numbers that suggest he’s going to be a great FPL asset.
It’s all role-dependent, of course. Diarra has scored four goals in his last four international appearances, so he’s capable of delivering, given the attacking license.
And, intriguingly, there’s maybe even the prospect of penalties, which would definitely elevate his appeal.
Diarra took and scored both of Strasbourg’s Ligue I spot-kicks in 2024/25. Sunderland, by contrast, had a terrible record from 12 yards – they’ve missed their last four! If a new regular taker is required, Diarra may be towards the front of the queue.
