Arsenal complete transfer deal for German goalkeeper Bernd Leno

Arsenal have completed a £20million move for German goalkeeper Bernd Leno, the club have confirmed.

Leno, 26, agreed a five-year deal with the Gunners on Monday and joins the Premier League club from Bundesliga outfit Bayer Leverkusen.

After joining Leverkusen from VfB Stuttgart II in 2010, Leno went on to play over 300 games for the Bundesliga giants, featuring in the Champions League.

His performances earned him a call-up to the Germany team in 2015 but he was left out of Joachim Low’s squad for the current World Cup in Russia.

Arsenal boss Unai Emery said: ‘We are very pleased that Bernd Leno will be joining us. Bernd is a goalkeeper of high quality and experience.

‘He has been a top performer and regular number one goalkeeper with Leverkusen in the Bundesliga for the past seven years.

‘We are all excited that Bernd has chosen Arsenal Football Club and look forward to starting working with him in pre-season.’

Leno is expected to be Arsenal’s new number one next season, taking the position from Premier League veteran Petr Cech.

The former Chelsea star experienced difficulties during Arsene Wenger’s final season at Arsenal and looks set to leave unless he is content playing back-up to Leno.

Unai Emery made defensive reinforcements his priority after replacing Wenger at the Emirates and signed Stephan Lichtsteiner, the experienced Swiss full-back, earlier in the month.

The Gunners also hope to wrap up deals for Sampdoria midfielder Lucas Torreira and Borussia Dortmund’s Sokratia Papastathopoulos in the coming days.