Losing Konsa now would land at the worst possible moment for Emery, who has already had to rebuild large parts of his defensive and midfield options this summer.
Morgan Rogers left for Chelsea, Youri Tielemans joined Manchester United, and Lucas Digne is closing in on a switch to Paris Saint-Germain — three exits that have already reshaped the Villa Park dressing room before a ball has been kicked in the new season.
Selling their most consistent defender on top of that would leave a hole Unai Emery has shown no appetite to create voluntarily.
That is why Aston Villa's stance on Konsa is firm despite Arsenal's growing interest: any deal happens on their terms, not the buyer's. The north London club's opening approach came in well under Villa's £60m valuation of the 28-year-old and was given short shrift, though Arsenal have continued to track the situation rather than walk away, and a second, improved offer is now expected.
Villa's financial position gives them room to hold firm — the Rogers and Tielemans sales alone brought in upwards of £140m — so there is no pressure to cash in on Konsa unless a genuinely high-level replacement is already lined up.
Talks over fresh terms for the England international, who has two years left on his current contract, are also under way, with the club keen to remove any uncertainty by getting him to commit before a bid forces the issue.
Konsa's value to Emery goes beyond the numbers. He has become one of the more understated fixtures of Villa's rise under the Spaniard, a defender trusted with both centre-back and right-back duties depending on the opponent, and someone whose consistency has rarely made headlines precisely because he so rarely puts a foot wrong.
That reliability is exactly what makes him hard to replace on short notice, and Arsenal's interest — sharpened by injury concerns of their own in defence — is a reminder of how highly he's now regarded outside Villa Park as well as within it.