Staff at Arsenal have worriedly reported that Arsene Wenger seems to believe his Christmas present is a world-class German centre-back.
Sources suggest the French manager keeps shaking the parcel addressed to him and making cheery suggestions that he is looking forward to bolstering his unconvincing back-line with its contents in the new year.
But co-workers at the Emirates Stadium have grown uneasy, aware that the Borussia Dortmund defender isn’t inside the box.
“It’s starting to get really awkward,” an insider at Arsenal told FourFourTwo.
“Arsene really thinks we’ve purchased one of the world’s most talented defenders as a Secret Santa present.
“We’ve tried to let him down gently, but the more we say it’s not Hummels, the more he winks and says that we really shouldn’t have.
“I guess there was no formal limit on what we spent, but we tend to keep it under a tenner. I got a pair of earrings.
“And besides, he’s seen the box, he’s even picked it up and shaken it. That suggests it’s not a six foot three product of Bayern Munich's youth system, surely?”
Sources close to Wenger have reported he has already started enthusing about how much use he intends to get out of his Christmas present and stressed that it’s so much better than the quad bike he’d also put on his list.
“I can’t help but feel it’s going to be a real anti-climax when Arsene opens the box and finds it’s Jermain Defoe,” our source concluded.
