Andre Santos
Arsenal defender Andre Santos could be set for a summer exit. Arsenal.com

Arsenal look set to lose Andre Santos in the summer with the midfielder likely to give up his fight for game time after the club purchased Nacho Monreal on deadline day.

The Daily Mirror claims that Santos considered moving to Galatasaray in January, with the Turkish club coming in for the Brazilian after he struggled to make his mark on the Gunners' squad this season.

But he turned down the offer from the side who have now acquired Didier Drogba and Wesley Sneijder, choosing to fight for his place at Arsenal instead.

However, the 29-year-old's plan to get more involved in Arsene Wenger's starting line up appears to have been thwarted by a last minute move by the north London club to purchase Monreal, and build on a defence which Wenger admitted was looking thin.

Santos has featured for Arsenal just 12 times this season, with eight of those being in the league.

He was one of a host of signings by Wenger in the final 24 hours of the summer 2011 window - the Frenchman had mixed success with his deals on that day, with Mikel Arteta proving to be a natural leader, while Yossi Benayoun, Gervinho and Park Chu Young have all disappointed.

Despite the speculation surrounding Santos, Wenger has recently insisted that he will keep faith inthe Brazilian, arguing that he stilll has a future is at the Emirates.

"Maybe people speak that he had a difficult game [against Liverpool] but he lacks competition," the Arsenal manager said.

"He is a style of player who needs competition because he is not a nervous type of player, he is a stamina type of player and get sharper through competition.

"Yes [the criticism of Santos is unfair] because if you watch the game again and you analyse very well his performance, you will be less critical.

"The first critics after the game are always a bit emotional because you have one or two big mistakes in your mind and we are all the same on that front.

"But when you watch the games again, you will see that he has done some good things."

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