According to the BBC’s David Ornstein, Aaron Ramsey today signed a pre-contract agreement with Juventus ahead of his summer move.
The Serie A giants pounced for the Wales international as soon as Arsenal pulled the plug on contract talks back in September.
Once his signing on fee is included, the 28-year-old will see his weekly earnings top £400,000, making him the highest paid British player of all time. Not bad.
Aaron Ramsey today signed pre-contract agreement to join Juventus in summer. 28yo penned 4yr deal after passing 2-part medical late Jan. Wales midfielder leaves Arsenal 30 June after 11yrs. Set to become all-time highest-paid GB player (basic salary), just over £400kpw #Juve #AFC
— David Ornstein (@bbcsport_david) February 11, 2019
Since signing for Arsenal in 2008, Ramsey has been on a roller coaster journey unmatched by any other Gunner.
Turning down Sir Alex Ferguson to join forces with Arsene Wenger, he was just starting to deliver on his potential at first-team level when Ryan Shawcross snapped his leg in two in February 2010. After recovering from his horrific injury he was sent on loan to Nottingham Forest and former club Cardiff to regain form and confidence.
While he struggled at times to shake off niggly injuries, he started to motor in an Arsenal shirt from the 2013/14 season when he scored 16 goals in 34 appearances including the drought-ending FA Cup final winner against Hull.
The midfielder would go on to win two more FA Cups, scoring the winner again in 2016 against Chelsea. To date, he’s made 359 appearances for Arsenal scoring 61 goals and making 64 assists. He also helped Wales to the semi-finals of EURO 2016; a competition that helped burnish his top-level credentials.
While supporters haven’t always agreed on his quality, there’s never been any doubting Aaron’s effort. We’ll be very sad to see him go.
Here’s hoping he can help us to a Champions League spot and a Europa League title before we pack him off to Italy.
I love and gonna miss Aaron but 400k is absolutely bonkers.
The 400k has to be taken into context. Thats 20M per year so Juve is essentially paying 80M for a top quality player coveted by more than half of the top 20 teams in the world. Say you think Ramsey is really only worth 200k per week for the sake of argument. That would imply that his sign on fee + “transfer fee” really only cost Juve 40M, which is really peanuts in today’s transfer market. I appreciate Aaron’s service over the years but when you consider the current environment (market + the gloom surrounding our club), the decision to… Read more »
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Where is that context when Ozil’s salary is in question. Ozil is undoubtedly a bigger star with much much bigger commercial pull than anyone at Arsenal.
The context is different because Özil was already an Arsenal player, it’s not like his salary was offset in part by not having to pay a transfer fee to another club. As far as Özil’s commercial pull, which was a fair point at the time, it is quickly diminishing and not being capitalized on if Özil keeps being frozen out of the squad. You could also argue that to replace Özil with another player would have required a substantial transfer fee, thus offsetting some of his wages, but then we’d likely have invested in someone younger with more resale value… Read more »
The problem with that argument is that if ozil left on a free arsenal wouldn’t have any money to replace him with in the first place so yes his wages obviously include what it would have cost at the time to replace him with. This is what AW was trying to say before that it will be a trend that is going to be common as time goes by to run contracts down to the last year. More money to the players than the club receiving the fee If UE chooses to use him or not that’s his choice. If… Read more »
You pay a big salary and long contract to give your player market value and/or prevent a move.
We put Ozil on top dollar but by not playing him lose out on both counts.
Aye, 83 million over 4 years. Seems bonkers but about right in today’s market. If somebody had taken him for 40 or 50 million last summer at 200k a week it wouldn’t be seen as a big deal.
Still deals like this may be why Wenger will be proven right about seeing more players run down contacts.
Too true
Wenger will be proven right.. Just as he was ridiculed when he said 4th place is a trophy. Its just infuriating that its our team that always has the initial backlash or immediate consequences when this type of situation will be the norm in a few years.
My dude i’m at peace with him leaving. Ozil too if he does this summer. my point was solely on his new wage which is absolutely ridiculous. you want to put it into context? the president of the USA earns $400K/year.
Ramsey is more qualified to be the President
Yaya Sanogo is more qualified to be the president.
How is that in context?
I’m not sure he’s even going to be a guaranteed starter in that Juve lineup. They have a pretty decent midfield already.
Good luck to Aaron, it’s always so much fun living in a new country and Turin is a beautiful city.
Trust me, for that wage per week? He’ll be starting alright…plus, save Matuidi n the Serb guy he’ll probably give more juice than any other central midfielder in the squad (I don’t rate Khedira better than him).
For that money fair play
All the best Aaron. Have a great career in Italy.
Good deal for him and juve, but not for Arsenal….
Best of luck Ramsey!
Wish him well. For the FA Cup final goals we’ll always be grateful. But Ramsey is now probably one of the top 5 best players in the world. The WORLD. Let that sink in for a second…
Always been a fan of Ramsey, but he’s not even guaranteed to be one of the top 5 in Serie A. And free or not, he’s not worth 400k per week.
I’m assuming Sean meant to include the word ‘paid’ in there to be fair
Agree, for that matter no one is worth 400k a week!
However good for Ramsey.
Yeh, have no hard feelings about this at all and wish him all the best.
It’s simple math really. They amortize his transfer fee saved into his contract. Let’s say he is a 200k/wk player x 4 years, comes out to 41.6M total. 400k/wk x 4 years, comes out to 83.2M total. So effectively they estimated him @ 41.6M (83.2M – 41.6M) or more in transfer fee if it would have been required. Seems fair to me that the player captures as much of the value of the transfer fee saved as possible. Good for him.
He doesn’t deserve to be started but the manager used him constantly, the club gave him a significant raise every time he signed a new contract. He’s not class then he helps in no small way in getting his country to the semifinals of the Eurocup…now it’s, he’s not worth 400k but he’s being paid by one of the best and most famous, most successful clubs ever in Europe. Think right!
Godspeed A. A. Ron. Truth is Aaron Ramsey on a FREE could be worth £400,000/week at Juventus, but Aaron Ramsey is not worth £400,000 week at Arsenal.
Why would any player in Ramsey level want to come to arsenal on a free if he doesn’t get something close to 400k?
iTs jUst hIs AgEnT…
Seriously though, it’s a shame for us but good luck to him, been a great servant for the club over the years and has always given it his all for us. It’s a great move for him but also perhaps it’s an opportunity for us to go in a different direction as well.
This is interesting. But it make sense as they don’t have to pay any transfer fee.
He got really good offer. Money plus guarantee to win few titles.
All the best Rambo.
Same for Özil. As Wenger said, not easy to find a player of his quality…
How come no other team in the world have a salary cap issue? Our intentions in the summer are so complicated that we have to not play ozil to force him to leave and let Ramsey go on a free when he was ready to sign, meanwhile Juventus has no problem increasing salary budget by 400000 a week 🙁 We need to get rid of all the dead weight floating around. Lichsteiner, Mustafi, Elneny and sorry to say, Jenkinson must all leave if it means having them means we cannot bring quality players in because of the salary cap. We… Read more »
It doesn’t help that we’ve been absolutely horrible at selling players the past few years. Juventus signs a lot of out of contract players and when they sell they get a lot for the players they move on.
Selling players for ‘low’ values is a symptom not a cause imo atom. The problem has been buying players who aren’t good enough & extending contracts for players on wages that are too high…then we find them hard to sell.
We’ve also been totally irresponsible in terms of allowing players who are salable to run down their contracts and leave for a fraction of their value – ramsey, sanchez, Welbeck, jack, etc. list goes on and on
Doesn’t the salary Juve is willing to pay Ramsey completely disprove your point?
Nothing is complicated. We were strangled only for this January window and also not many other clubs in England were actually buying players.
“How come no other team in the world have a salary cap issue?”
Being the biggest club in Italy and consistently getting to the CL latter rounds helps, no doubt.
Na, I was talking about the salary cap rule which says you can only increase your salary by 7% every year, I think I read about it in the ornstein interview.
I think there’s a EPL FFP-type regulation which controls how much a team can spend on wages. But the reason we’re falling foul of it is because we have the 4th of 5th biggest wage bill in the Prem without the revenue from CL football or competitive sponsorship deals. The latter will be sorted out in the summer, though the former depends on how we get until the end of the season…
Lack of CL for 2 seasons running hurt us compounded with some poor decisions in market like Lichsteiner and Ozil holding up wage bill further
Management of transfers has been poor after Wenger/Law.
Wenger use to be derided for prioritizing CL top 4 pot over domestic trophies (other than title)
How quickly the tune has changed for some people.
Transfer management has been ooor since wenger/law? Lol
2 transfer windows? Lol
I remember the day we smashed the transfer fee record to buy Supermac for £333,333. I’m so very old.
Good luck Rambo, I will miss you.
It does sound like a lot of money for a computer
I remember us breaking the transfer record to sign Dennis for £7.5m. I think it stood for about a week until Liverpool signed Stan Collymore for £8.5m.
Makes it clear why we let go of him. Anyway, good luck in Italy. Surely he’s guaranteed to win a few Serie-A titles.
Good luck to him. Hope it works out….that is mad money for Juve to pay though if true.
You think any part of Jack Wilshere is scratching his head wondering where’d it all go so wrong. Two great talents with loads of promise, each with injury histories, one leaves with respect, appreciation and perhaps ‘newer generation’ legend status; to go off and win guaranteed titles, in a nice City, for a historic club, on a boatload of money and the other is at West Ham.
Wilshere knows where it went wrong..injuries.
And lack if talent.
Without his injuries he would have been a world class player and almost certainly the captain. There was never a lack of talent
Talent is something Jack never lacked, his aggressive playing style might have been his undoing though. Or just plain bad luck.
I don’t think Jack lacked talent. Far from it. Jack’s biggest problem came from his technique due to his tenacious terrier like play. Which is both a good a bad asset. The way he goes into challenges leaves him susceptible to injury. Jack has good vision, awareness and at one point had greater technical ability that Aaron. Aaron has been more successful due to his overall style of play and is more athletic than Jack. Aaron is a proper runner, has great pace and good skill, and is certainly the best player we have at present who can translate the… Read more »
You can’t ever accuse Jack of lack of talent…ever!
Re. Jack, I think it was the attitude. I dont think he was behaving like a true/required professional off the field when he needed to (e.g. following the diet or taking care of his body) and seemed (to me at least) to have a blase attitude. By the time he started doing all that, he was out of time and chances. In fact I remember Wenger alluding to this exact possibility in relation to Wilshere in the media once. I know there are cunts out there who abused their bodies much more than him and still end up with a… Read more »
Yeah, I’d agree with that. Jack playing with the U21s/Reserves while rebuilding his fitness levels and totally losing it with some kid springs to mind. The night club antics, smoking etc also – not thst I particularly care what they do in their free time. Aaron, on the other hand- injuries aside and dips in form (Not unexpected for a developing player) really embraced the values of the club – even when we sent him out on loan – I don’t think there’s a football fan anywhere that could argue that Aaron has not been the model professional even with… Read more »
I was jabbing West Ham on my original post, as well as the nostalgic moment of the British core photo, not attempting to question Wilshere’s talent which at peak Wilshere was unquestionable. I think all of us would prefer to play for Arsenal and if we’d have to choose between West Ham or Juventus, to me that seems like an easy choice, especially with €80m. It’d be a very interesting discussion for a podcast to breakdown that British core we all had hoped would develop into more. To examine whether (lack of talent Jenkinson), injury bad luck (Wilshere, Ramsey and… Read more »
He’s done well for himself. A great salary and surely a few medals to add to his FA cup medals. Let’s hope we can replace him with a quality signing.
It will be an interesting attacking line next season at Juventus with Ronaldo and Ramsey playing together along with Costa and Dybala.. Could be a truly scary Juventus side in the CL..
259 appearances or 359? I’ve seen both reported. Either way that’s not a great deal over 11 years. Good luck Rambo you had your issues with injury and at times would frustrate but the two FA cup winners were one of the highlights of the late Wenger era and that 2013/14 season was outstanding.
Actually 359 isn’t too bad if that’s the correct stat. Math was never my strong point.
This make me extremely sad, he might not be a world beater but no one can deny he is a pretty good player, and one I wanted to retire with Arsenal. Good Luck Aaron!
£83,200,000 “basic”, over 4years is insane, fair-play to him and his agent. I really like Rambo, but at 28 and with his niggling injuries, he’s certainly not worth that. With these types of figures and the current state of our wage bill, it’s not hard to see why we pulled the plug, he’ll be worth hardly anything in 4yrs. Where as if we buy a young player for £40,000,000 on a 5yr deal on contract on £100,000 p/w? That’ll cost us £60,800,000 over 4years, and providing we spent that money well? We’ll have an asset who-still holds some value in… Read more »
“Where as if we buy a young player for £40,000,000 on a 5yr deal on contract on £100,000 p/w? That’ll cost us £60,800,000 over 4years, and providing we spent that money well? We’ll have an asset who-still holds some value in 3 years time” And what if we didn’t spend that money well? What you’re describing is much more of a gamble for us than bringing in a player of Ramsey’s pedigree on a free for Juve. The money Juve are spending is equivalent to bringing Ramsey in for a £40m transfer fee and 200k wages, which if anything is… Read more »
The whole point of signing free agents is to not overpay for them, and to reduce cost. Sure, the free player will get a high wage and a decent sign on fee, but these costs should still amount to a considerably lower costs than actually buying the player. Else it becomes besides the point. So I would assume that the player valued himself at approx 300k+ a week for a contract renewal at Arsenal or a new contract for any other club. Add say another 100k for being a free agent, makes it less costly than a (50m contract buy… Read more »
I will never understand describing a contract in weekly income. It seems like 4 year, £80 million is much more informative.
It’s a hangover from the early days of professionalism when football players made double or maybe four times what a miner or factory worker made, and the comparison made sense.
…….. and a maximum of £100pw
For some reason, with football, I’m so used to seeing it per week that 80 million/year means less. Honestly I’d have to do some math to go back and compare to other footballers when quoted in per year.
Same here. P/W is it for football.
Still some here accusing the club for not prolonging his contract? Still some for pitying poor Aaron who just wanted to be loyal to the club but was pushed our by the nasty and ungrateful club? He has always wanted to leave. Proof!
Not sure how you know this. Everything I have read and heard is that he asked for a salary equivalent to Mkhitaryan’s, and wanted to stay at Arsenal. There is no dispute that it was Arsenal that ended negotiations.
Personally I think it’s somewhere in between. I think Aaron would have stayed but his agent got greedy and then got unlucky when Ivan left and the deal that was on the table didn’t look so rosy to Raul. I wish Aaron the best. He has a young family to provide for and his career could be over at any time due to injuries, and he above all people knows that.
He’s moving up, I wouldn’t call him unlucky.
That’s just bullshit right there…
That deal works out at over £80million. I’m a big fan of Ramsey, but that’s insane money… I mean was there really enough comeptition to drive his salary up to £400k? Something tells me it’s probably more that it works out as £400k pw ie £250k per week plus a hefty signing on fee and image rights/sponsorships, rather than a contract at £400k pw. I’m by no means doubting the Ornacle, just simply wondering if he may be condensing the information to fit it all into a tweet/headline. Regardless, I wish Ramsey all the best and will forever be grateful… Read more »
I’m sure it’s something like you are saying. No one will argue he isn’t worth 80m over 4 years straight up.
I wonder how much of it is part of the free transfer? Image rights? How taxes play into this?
If it’s true arsenal could only offer him 180 and he was willing to sign that. It shows how much different arsenal are compared to the top clubs in wages being offered.
Good luck to him.
Well played to anyone who can arrange a paycheck like this
Are you serious? This part of the problem, where do you think this money comes from. Straight out of fans pockets
You are right. Ultimately the money has to come from fans every time a footballer and agent take a huge new deal.
Even if a club win the treble, it wouldn’t cover the salaries of a club.
Do they know his injury record? Emery has been getting good things from Ramsey because he understands it has to be limited time on the pitch.
Where are the he’s shite and would never get into a top team starting 11 elsewhere guys? Looking quite stupid now, eh?
It also really makes Wenger’s comments about how clubs would increasingly let players run down their contracts look stupid as well. Wenger/Gazidas let our 3 star assets run down their contracts & we got Ramsey – nada, leaving on a free Sanchez- we ended up swapping him for a player with much higher wages and 1/3 the production Ozil – signed to one of the 10 highest contracts in all of Europe and now we are most likely going to have to pay him to leave as the new manager doesn’t want him That is just beyond irresponsible management for… Read more »
No one “let” players run down their deals. Ozil and Ramsey were offered new deals 2-1.5 years before their deals expired. They both knew that they were big assets to the club and that if they could run down their contacts a bit longer, they could extract more money from the club. Sanchez signed a 3 year deal when he joined us, so in his second season, when he really shined, he only had a year left on his contract. He too could hold the club at ransom. No one “lets” players run down their contracts. It’s just a new… Read more »
Except that it is totally unique to Arsenal. How many top players do you see running their contract down to free or 6 months outside arsenal? The answer is basically none as other clubs all tie them down or sell them.
I would further add Sanchez initially signed a 4 year deal and for whatever reason we chose not to try to extend him after he scored 25 goals the first year. Wenger had a history of indecision in his later years you simply don’t see at other top clubs
It is not “totally unique” to Arsenal; it is increasingly common, as Wenger predicted. Many top players in the Prem are refusing to sign an extension until they are in the final year of their contract, exactly as Ramsey did.
@different George but it really isn’t at all common. when players get to the final year of their contract at other clubs they either resign in the summer window are sold. you really don’t see superstars entering the last 6 months of their contract as we allowed sanchez, ozil and ramsey to do, let alone leave for free. The major issue I have is once a player gets down to the last year of his contract he either needs to resign in the summer window or be sold. That is literally how every other club in the world works as… Read more »
Emre Can left Liverpool for free. Khedira, Dani Alves and I think Matuidi left for free, Courtois was sold for peanuts because he refused to sign, Martial was running down his contract and could have left for free if it wasn’t for the recent change of manager, same for a bunch of other United players who just recently signed with months left on their contracts, Hazard could leave for free next season, so could Marcelo at Madrid. Ronaldo refused to sign and had to be sold. Ramsey is the only “big” player that’s leaving us for free. The situation is… Read more »
Well that explains why he wasn’t in a rush to sign our soposed offer. It makes sense the club withdrew its offer now and both move on. No way could we or should we match that for an injury prone player. We got our hands tied enough so all the best to him. The cash bubble must burst soon, it’s madness hearing these crazy figures. Multi millionaires after signing their first few contracts and that’s just the above avarge players.!
Wow. Good on you Ramsey. Get your money.
I thought Rambo would have stayed at Arsenal if the contract offer was right, because he loves the club, but shit I’m pretty sure I don’t even love the club that much to walk away from a 200k a week pay bump.
Good luck to Rambo, a steady, if unspectacular player over his arsenal years.
If Juventus want to sell him before his contract is up, they will be in same situation we find with Ozil.
Insane.
Capitalism unhinged.
Capitalism is the worlds greatest invention, between 2001-2011 700,000,000 people we’re moved out of povertydue to capitalism.
As the late great barroness Thatcher once quipped “ The left are happy for the poor to be poorer, providing that the rich are less rich, you’ll never create wealth that way”
Capitalism isn’t the problem, corporatism and overly bureaucratic structures built from the top down, rather than the bottom up, is where our problems lie.
Capitalism has been extraordinarily successful, yes. But the thing that has made it so powerful is also its greatest weakness, it relies on prices determined in markets. That’s a very powerful concept and incredibly efficient, but not everything can be priced. And increasingly the things that cannot be priced are becoming much more important than those that can. Absurd wages for footballers based on their mass appeal and audience is an example of power laws baked into the modern form of capitalism. But you’re mistaken if you think that these huge increases in wealth are a positive thing, because they… Read more »
Define poverty though. Going from $1 a day to $2 might technically mean you’ve been “moved out of poverty” but you’re still fucking poor! Add in the negative externalities such as pollution, climate change, general environmental degradation, social inequality and the degeneration of society and shared values and you’d have to say that modern day Capitalism is a mixed bag at best. IIRC John Rawls suggested that the only way an unequal society can be just is if the poorest in that society would still be better off compared to being in a more equal society. Given the suffering of… Read more »
For that money, go on and take care of your family Rambo
Good for him. Personally I don’t see him a regular starter at Juve, but I wish him all the best
Not surprising. And good for Rambo. But we should have locked him down last Jan. Instead the hit and Mslintat team demure on Ozil and paid way too much for the German. The only reason I could see the addition of Mhlitaryan then was a hedge on one of Ozil or Ramsey leaving. In the end we kept Ozil but now may also see him leave depending on a good offer this summer. Which leaves Unai with Mhkitaryan as one of the main orchestrators left and potentially if he can shed his early inhibitions maybe Dennis. With regard Mhki, he… Read more »
Yeah it is bad. We got nothing for him. We let him leave in a free
What’s all this other crap you write? I just don’t get it. Mahrez never would have come here. Summer of ‘17 city had the bid of 60-70m rejected. Jan ‘18 we needed auba more with laca struggling and I’m thinking knowingly hurt.
I wonder if he would mind donating a week’s wages to me lol one can dream!!!
Sad to see Aaron go, but wish him all the best with Juve.
My biggest issue with this whole ordeal is why wasn’t he transferred out in the summer Arsenal could have easily gotten 30-40m in fees for him at that point? Why couldn’t UE make a decision about Ramsey being his type of player before the transfer window closing? He had all preseason camp to figure this out since welsh team wasn’t in the World Cup. Instead he waited 2-3 games into the season to figure out he wasn’t worth the new contract so he had it pulled when Ramsey wanted to sign? The club gave chambers a new contract after preseason… Read more »
Wish I could thumb this up more than once. I was surprised by emery’s change of mindset regarding Ramsey who he initially said would be the player he’d look to build around (along with Auba ). Does emery really not rate Ramsey anymore, and if so why did he wait until just after the window closed in August to do a complete 180? or was this a Sanllehi decision because he decided that we couldn’t afford Ramsey? But again if that’s the case surly that call has to be made while it was still possible to sell him
That wouldn’t make sense with regards to Raul pulling the co tract since it was already on the table and it was pulled for whatever reason. So they offered him something they could afford and he was willing to sign.
It’s just disappointing. Raul has been there since Jan ‘18 so he’s had plenty of time to evaluate players contracts.
Just hope for his sake he performs better than the other arsenal player that left for 400k a week. All the best Ramsey Arrivedeci
To be honest, I am just excited for the dude, his family and his agent. At the point where Arsenal is at currently, we need more than a Ramsey in the side. Good luck to him in the Serie A
Agent is highly skilled in negotiations. Bravo.
So Arsene is right after all. I think we can see a trend of players running down their contracts and earning more $. Maybe in future clubs will get players to sign a 5- year + 2-year extension option to protect themselves. #Arseneknows
I wonder how much his agent pocketed.
Good luck to him, a great player who never played enough in his best position and suffered a bloody awful injury. Made me laugh when I heard Emery’s (if it’s true) quote of Ramsey doesn’t fit into the all action requirements…really? Box to box player who never stops running!! If that’s the case why did Xhaka get a new contract!? He can’t even run. All the best Ramsey and go an pick up some medals as you wouldn’t have got them here