Arsenal star rated Europe's most valuable defender

By the CIES Football Observatory, Hector Bellerin has received ratings as the most valuable defender in world football as Barcelona plot to steal the fullback from Arsenal.

The 21-year-old defender remains the Spanish giant’s number one choice to replace Dani Alves should the Brazilian transfer to Juventus as is widely expected comes true.

The Gunners, Having tied Bellerin to a four year contract last summer; however, this we see Arsenal in a strong position to negotiate as they remains reluctant to lose one of the world football’s outstanding young prospect and will see Arsenal in a strong position to negotiate.

Bellerin is valued at £43.1million by CIES’ metrics for analysing a player’s worth – a figure not matched by any other full-back in world football.

The 21-year-old Spaniard was called up to Vicente del Bosque’s Euro 2016 squad on Tuesday only two days after making his international debut,

2013.

David Alaba of Bayern Munich’s is the most valuable centre-back on the list who is estimated valued is at £37.5m. CIES, a research group founded in Switzerland in 2005, prorogates that the correlation concerning their algorithm, which takes into account a player’s age, performances, contract length, and experience among other factors, and transfer fees paid for players in Europe’s top five leagues has been 80 per cent since 2013.

It places a cumbersome price tag on Bellerin, who has only been a regular in Arsenal’s first team since January 2015 after a serious injury to Mathieu Debuchy as well as Calum Chambers and Nacho Monreal.

If Barcelona were to pay such a fee for Bellerin “their former youth product” it will make the full-back the fourth most expensive player in Nou Camp history, behind only Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Luis Suaraz and Neymar.

The Spain full-back has offered little indication that he would think through departing the Emirates, though he described interest from his former club as “nice” last week.

In May, Bellerin once more professed his happiness in London, where he swiftly settled on his arrival as a 17-year-old in 2011.

“I say every year that England is my home now,” Bellerin said.

“I've lived there for many years; my family and my girlfriend are there. I'm very happy there so I don't see myself anywhere other than Arsenal.”

In the 2015-16 season, no Premier League defender provided more assists than Bellerin and he continued that form in Spain’s friendly win over South Korea on Wednesday, providing an assist for Manuel Agudo Duran (known as Nolito) in a 6-1 victory.

The 21-year-old Arsenal defender is set to battle with the Los Rojiblancos’s Juanfran for the starting spot in holders Spain’s first game of Euro 2016, against Croatia in Bordeaux.