Shakhtar Donetsk TROLL Arsenal fans by teasing ‘some news’ before revealing their friendly schedule

Shakhtar Donetsk taunted Arsenal fans multiple times on Twitter with deliberately anticlimactic news announcements, with the Premier League side working on a deal for Ukrainian star Mykhailo Mudryk.

Gunners supporters might have thought their team had finally made a breakthrough in negotiations for the young striker after Shakhtar claimed the club had “packed up some news” on Saturday, only to announce their friendly schedule for mid season.

Mikel Arteta was left smiling after questions about Mudryk led fans to conclude they were close to his arrival, with reports the club will pay £50m upfront and the Ukrainian outfit expected to agree to less than £80m. million proposed.

Shakhtar Donetsk taunted Arsenal fans on Twitter on Saturday after hinting at “news” to be announced by the Ukrainian team.

The Gunners will have woken up hoping to finally seal a deal for the 22-year-old, given Shakhtar’s perhaps deliberately important tweets.

Gunners seek deal for star striker Mykhailo Mudryk

They started with a message saying that a news announcement was imminent, writing: “Today we prepared some news for you”, followed by an eye emoji.

That was followed for just over an hour with: ‘Looks like it’s time to reveal the first piece…’

Instead of the transfer deal Arsenal fans will have been looking for, however, the club sent out its fixture list with the Premier League side in Turkey for their mid-season winter break.

The list includes games with Austria Vienna, followed by Slovenian clubs Koper and Maribor, Ludogorets, Sarajevo and Dinamo Tbilisi over a 20-day period starting on January 10.

But they quickly regained the attention of the long-awaited Gunners, tweeting: ‘There’s more cool stuff to come. We are ready to share another news as soon as our page reaches 51,000 subscribers.’

Within an hour and 15 minutes, the club had reached 52,800 supporters, but the news was yet to break as Shakhtar kept viewers guessing.

Mikel Arteta couldn’t help but smile when asked about Mudryk on Friday afternoon

But later, at 12:23 p.m., Shakhtar tweeted one more word: ‘Mudryk?’ followed by a confused emoji.

And once again, fans of the Premier League outfit were left disappointed as the striker was announced to have won the club’s Player of the Year award for 2022.

Arsenal’s search for Mudryk has been one of the main transfer sagas of the January window, and Arteta’s team have already turned down several offers as they look to land the star striker.

The Gunners appeared to have some serious competition in the 22-year-old’s signing race, and Chelsea were thought to be monitoring the situation closely, but now they appear to be prime candidates for his services.