Wenger unlikely to move for defender

Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger appears unlikely to sign a centre-back before the start of the Barclays Premiership season, despite a shortage of numbers in his defence.

Wenger has been linked with Curtis Davies but is reluctant to spend the £10m (€14.6m) fee West Brom reportedly want for the youngster.

Following Sol Campbell’s departure and injury to Philippe Senderos, which will rule him out of the first month of the season, Kolo Toure and Pascal Cygan are the only senior centre-backs at Wenger’s disposal.

“I know the prices in England,” he said. “The prices for young talent are the prices you’d pay for established players. We do it sometimes. We did it for Theo Walcott, for example, but we cannot do it always.”

Wenger also has Ivory Coast youngster Johan Djourou and is positive his remaining centre-backs can impress this season and build on the club’s Champions League run to the final in the last campaign.

“We have Toure, Djourou, Senderos and Cygan,” he said on www.arsenal.com. “If we can find someone and we can get them then we will do it, but at the moment I have not found anybody.

“But remember these defenders went 10 games in the Champions League without conceding a goal so I cannot say they are bad. I am a strong believer in them.

“We just want to improve our collective team play on last year. We did that well during the season and we want to keep this development going.”