According to the Times (£), it looks very unlikely that Arsenal will extend Danny Welbeck’s contract despite him suffering an ankle injury that could sideline him for the rest of the season.
The England international underwent surgery last month after a bad fall in the 0-0 draw with Sporting Lisbon and is likely to be out of action for between six to nine months.
In the past, the Gunners have triggered clauses to extend the contracts of injured players – Santi Cazorla being the prime example – however, Welbeck does not have such a line in his current deal. In this instance, the club appears willing to let the player become a free agent with a view to incorporating Reiss Nelson when he returns from his loan in Germany.
A couple of weeks ago, Raul Sanllehi would only say on the situation: “He [Welbeck] knows he will get all of the support from the club.”
According to the report, Welbeck turned down the chance to move to Southampton last summer, possibly with one eye on a chance of a lucrative Bosman move. The timing of his injury is very unfortunate, but hopefully, if he makes a return before May he’ll have the chance to court new suitors.
In the meantime, get well soon Danny.
Sensible from an Arsenal financial point of view, sad for Danny from an injury point of view.
I’m sure he will get good offers once fit, England international with no transfer fee, potentially coming into the best years of his career.
There’s nothing sensible about it financially imo, Welbeck is yet another useful player who will leave for no free. We could have gotten 15/20m for him if we were competent in this regard.
He refused to move in the summer. It helps if you read article before commenting.
You could also argue though that they shouldn’t have let him (or any player) enter the last year of their contract. If I was in his position I would hold out for a Bosman too in my last year. No criticism of the player – I’m a Welbeck fan, more that the club need to eradicate this poor player contract management if we’re truly looking at moving forward with a self sustaining model. I do wish him all the best and hope we get to see him in some capacity in an Arsenal shirt before the season ends to give… Read more »
A little bit of a moot argument. If the player doesn’t want to sign he can’t be forced, and equally if they don’t want to leave you can’t make them.
From what I understand arsenal didn’t want to give him a wage hike (think most fans would agree that he’s handy to have, but not somebody we want to give a mega contact) but equally he didn’t want to leave.
Arsenal could do better with contracts, but inevitable that a bosman will come around from time to time.
In fairness – We had a regime change and the club had no frame of reference for what would happen when a new manager took over. neither had the players / agents or fans. What would the new manager look for? could players buy in to his training and approach. Would this be like a wenger appointment or a rioch appointment – i.e how much impact would the new manager bring? We all knew it was coming… Wengers days were numbered from the day he missed out on cl qualification in 2016/17. Ramsay and Welbeck are by products of that… Read more »
“They shouldn’t have let him (or any player) enter the last year of their contract.” I get what you’re saying, but technically, if a player wants to just fulfill their contract and part ways afterwards, in the end there is not much a club can do. It’s not like a club can literally force a player to either renew or transfer. Persuade, bribe, cajole, negotiate, deceive them into it even, yeah, sure. But… I feel like a lot of fans actually think we can force players to take one direction or another as if they’re little more than a herd… Read more »
Very true. I guess the risk on the player’s side is if they suffer a serious injury when nearly out of contract they could well be worse off financially. Im not sure that if I was in such a position I would turn down a reasonable offer to secure a Bosman… but then again I never made it professional!
Sadists, how cruel can a club be?
You beat me to it
Might not be all sad. Just because they’re not extending the contract it doesn’t mean they won’t let him finish recovery under our medical team and even begin training like many former players do and some who are leaving on free have done also for periods of time until their next contract.
I don’t think Arsenal will straight up curb him, they just won’t add the opportunity for an extra year of wages.
I was very keen for us to renew Welbeck’s contract, I always thought we look much more solid with him in the team, but if there was no desire from the club to renew his deal before the injury? Then I don’t see why his injury should change the clubs position now.
To me, it is not necessarily a football decision. It has everything to do with Ozil’s contract. The club has decided not to be in that situation anymore. Wenger used to predict that every player that his club would like to retain will not sign until the end of his current contract. It was just a matter of fact for Wenger but Sanhelli doesn’t see it that way. He was used to ”I want to remain at Barcelona for the rest of my career”.
Looked prone to becoming a good third option striker for us before injury struck again. I hope we find someone of his quality who is willing to play back up to our two star strikers.
Get well soon Danny and all the best wherever you go.
Or let Eddie step up to claim that 3rd option spot.
Eddie needs to be loaned out, should have happened this year. Nelson will probably be the one getting those mins next year.
I reckon we need a big lump, a Giroud type, we can bring on when needed. Someone with enough experience, skill and physicality to break through in the last 30 minutes when we’re stuck in a grind with so called lesser opponents who’ve dug in defensively.
Not sure Eddie is ready for that role yet.
Haller from Frankfurt would be a nice option…
I watched a Youtube clips of him and he looks promising. Although based on that clip Premiership opposition will be less lenient on him than some of the space he’s given in the Bundesliga. He’d probably have a period of adjusting.
Gutted for Danny. Hew’s been really effective off the bench under Emery (like a few others).
I think he would’ve thrived and its a shame we wont get to see it. That said, happy for the salary space.\
Get well soon Danny!!!!
Give s̶o̶l̶d̶i̶e̶r̶s̶ Ramsey f̶o̶o̶t̶b̶a̶l̶l̶e̶r̶s̶’̶ Welbeck’s wages
Like what you did with the letter. Where’s your mummy?
Seems the next few transfer windows will see a lot of Wenger’s signings being moved on; Ramsey, Welbeck, I can see Elneny and Koscielney leaving next summer too, and Ospina, I wonder if this is coming from Raul and Vinai believing that Wenger has overpaid on all these contracts, or maybe Sven believes that new players are the best policy for Emery to move the team forward. I have to say though, Leno, Sokratis, Torreira, Guendouzi, and Leitchsteiner have been a big success story so far.
Probably a combination of all of the above.
Not gonna lie, with Barca looking for a short-term cheap CB option, I kinda hope they go for Kos. I really don’t want him to leave, but he really deserves recognition and some major titles before he retires, and we’re currently in transition. I’d be happy to see him win a league title at Barca.
Would be funny to see him in CB next to Verm though
I’d say they’re looking to replace backup and squad players on 40-80k a week contracts with younger prospects on 10-40k ones to free up funds
if we could get 20m from theo, surely we could get around the same amount for Welbz, and double that for Ram. probably get around 10-15m for jack too. lots of English players going out of the club for free when i thought English players were supposed to command a premium price in the epl. excited that Rowe, Reiss, eddiemayang will be the next generation though.
Who will pay a penny for a guy who is unlikely to play again before the end of this season? Financial sense says you wait until his contract runs out and then decide on an offer. If anyone out there is willing to pay for an asset which cannot provide a return and which will be available free before he can, then I have some magic beans for sale. Roll up, roll up.
Right, I’ll have two bags of em beans.
Magic you say? I’ll take 10.
Not necessarily. You just need to find 2 potential buyers and make them go toe to toe vs each other. If Club B wants Danny and value him at $5M in Jan, then maybe all of a sudden Club A would be willing to pay $10M, even if they would prefer to get him for free in 6 months.
Although I’m not sure if there are rules against selling an injured player…
You just need to find two potential buyers willing to go head to head for a guy who can’t play until next August. I still have those magic beans if you want some…..there’s never any shortage of takers it seems.
Two different buyers???…Seems like a lot of work…why try? You don’t strike me as an opportunist ?
No rules against it- remember we bought a player with a broken back
Danny doesn’t have the reputation for a bidding war I fear, regardless teams buying in January aren’t thinking of August generally. They need players who can change or augment their current season.
Also from his pov, rehab with a paycheck at arsenal then a signing on fee or rehab at a new club, on possibly a lesser wage?
I know what I’d choose.
its understandable really
What makes the Ramsey & Welbeck decisions difficult is that you have to work with what’s in front of you and not the way one wishes things were. The fact is the new coach came in with 2 players who were down to 1 year left on their contracts. Welbeck is a useful squad player BUT Reis also has a lot of upside and much lower wages. The ideal would have been to sell him but you can’t make a guy leave if he doesn’t want to. Welbeck gambled that he would have a great year and sign a lucrative… Read more »
He has been a good squad player for us when healthy, but for no fault of his own the problem has always been “when healthy” with him. Emery seems to have had confidence in him, but had he not been injured my guess was we would have looked to sell him in the January window. I think Emery feels we have some good young talent in the wings (esp Nelson) and keeping a player like Welbeck after this year would have blocked their path to the first team. Welbeck is young enough to still get a good contract with another… Read more »
I feel like this is going to become the norm in Europe in the next few years.Player wages are insanely high and not all clubs are funded by oil money. Add stupid agent fees to the mix which makes transfers more and more non-sensical.
Arsenal are ahead of the curve in this regard. Albeit the wrong curve.
Hope things turn out well for Danny!
Thing is if a player runs down his contract they are gambling that they don’t get injured in the last year BUT its a no-lose gamble if Arsenal just renews the injured player’s contract anyway. So this sends a message to all the players tempted to do this and that will help towards not getting in the same situation of losing players we wanted to keep in the long run. Obviously, its hard on Welbeck, who perhaps couldn’t have forseen the regime change.