Mikel Arteta is optimistic he can persuade Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang to stay at Arsenal but he accepts the striker needs to feel the love from the club.
The Gabon international said earlier this week that he’s at a crossroads in his career and suggested the Gunners have more work to do if they are to reach an agreement.
Aubameyang moved to the Emirates in January 2018 and has since scored 61 goals in 97 appearances. His current deal ends in the summer of 2021 and he would then be in a position to walk away for free.
Conducting his pre-Man City press conference on Zoom the boss was quizzed repeatedly about the status of talks with his captain and his most recent comments.
“I think it is our responsibility to make him feel this is the right next step in his career,” said Arteta.
“In order to do that, he needs to feel valued, he needs to feel he belongs to us and we want him, and then he really needs to believe that we can take the club forward in the way we want to do, and he is going to be a key player to do that.
“At the moment I am extremely happy with how he has been performing and behaving, I have a really good relationship with him where we can discuss face to face a lot of things. As far as I am aware, he is very happy at the club.”
Arteta was also quick to point out that negotiating a new contract in the current circumstances had been difficult.
“I think in a different context we would have liked to do things much quicker but obviously we have been really tight with time and communication as well,” he said.
“These unprecedented times bring a lot of uncertainty and things are getting clearer and clearer every day, we are a step closer to get back playing football and moving forward.”
He added: “We’ve had many discussions with Pierre, his family and agent, and I’m pretty positive that we can find the right agreement for all parties.”
“We are trying, as a club, to finalise the deals that are more urgent and are a priority for us. The ones you are talking about [Bukayo and Auba] – they are both really important, not just for now but for the future of the club as well and if the club has something to announce, they will do it in the right moment.”
Arteta knows full well that Arsenal could make thing easier for themselves if they seal qualification for next season’s Champions League. Of course, the matter is out of our hands.
“I think that [finishing in the top four] will help to persuade anybody, but we are very lucky to have the club that we have right behind us.
“There are a lot of players who want to come and join us, but it’s not just about who do we want to attract, it’s about how happy the players are that are here and how convinced they are that they’re at the right place because it’s almost our obligation to be fighting for every trophy and playing in the Champions League with this club.”
sell auba for 30m buy upamecano and hope he’s not mustafi.
Interesting response to a thread about most likely the PLs best striker
As good as Upamecano reportedly is, i doubt he’ll score 20+ goals a season
Saliba is joining in June and Pablo Mari will complete his transfer for £7.5m as well. There’s no chance we spend £40m+ on Upamecano, or any centre back, unless we get rid of 2/3 of Holding, Chambers, Sokratis, Mustafi and Luiz
Three of them will be gone by the end of 2021 (Luiz and Sokratis for sure) but I doubt it will happen this year.
Sounds a lot like when AW was here
I think if you read between the lines and especially what MA is saying, baiscally he needs to be paid what he is worth, which is quite likely NOT what the AFC board are willing to do
Like Blogs I too think he’ll go but would rather him be sold than another catastrophe where a p[layer worth millions is left to walk for nothing, sadly I see the latter happening rather than the former
Anyone else have zero faith in ‘Don Raul’
#RaulSanellhiGetOutOfOurClub
Aubameyang is a top shelf Champions League player in the peak of his career. We’re a Europa League club who has had to enforce wage cuts on our players as it is. Can we pay Aubameyang what he’s worth?
You talk sense. It just hurts.
Wholly agree, but for how long will he be able to sustain this? The vast majority of stats and scientific analysis says that most players (anyone who’s not a defender start to drop after their 30’s which is why AW wouldn’t ever sanction more than a 1yr extension, even for the elite & legends like DB10 & RP7 Can we afford another £300k p/w on someone who will most probably be in decline in the next 2 years? Risky to say the least This isn’t to say it WILL happen, but even as recently as Sanchez,… Read more »
Not too long ago Arteta was saying we shouldn’t have to convince players to come to or stay at Arsenal. Life comes at you fast sometimes…
Exactly, everything depends on who you are. Some people deserve special treatment. I watched Auba’s interview directly in French. Without saying it, he was conveying the following message: If you want me to stay, accept my big demands. It is up to you.
Not all of us are with blue bloods.
Some will always get the special treatment, regardless if they deserved it or not. In this case, PEA deserves every special treatment he gets
What sort of wage would we need to offer him to entice him to stay, and not leave on a free and go to PSG, Juve or the like? And if we give him a massive contract, what’s the chance that turns out the way it did with Ozil and Sanchez? Not worth the risk if you ask me, we need to try to sell him, even if he has been brilliant for us.
I agree. I’d much rather overpay to get Saka’s deal over the line than do the same for Aubameyang
Wouldn’t it be fair to say that Ozil and Sanchez are the exceptions not the rule? Nothing about Auba’s goal scoring or injury record suggests we’re going to have a big problem with appearances anytime soon. Extending him on a contract similar to other top players in the league, excluding Ozil and Sanchez, seems less risky to me than selling him and hoping we can sign someone as consistent.
It seems to me like Auba has told the club they need to sign a couple players this summer in order to convince him they are serious about contending Now. He wants to win and now the ball is in their court, simple enough
The interesting part about everybody saying we should keep Auba so he can fire us into the CL is that we’ve had him for 2.5 seasons now and we’ve never looked further from qualifying. With Liverpool and City miles in front, Chelsea already making big signings and Manchester United likely to follow suit, there’s a very good chance that in June 2021 we’ll be talking about how to replace Aubameyang having not qualified for the CL, but without even receiving a transfer fee and with Lacazette having 1 year left on his contract. I’d love Auba to stay and fire… Read more »
PEA needs serious convincing, we all know that. I think if the board comes out clean and say “look PEA we know what you targets are, those are our targets too, let’s help each other achieve those targets, we’ll provide your team the best players we need and in return you’ll contribute and help us achieve these targets” and then they act on it and bing in proper players and increase his salary a bit. He’ll stay. Otherwise if they don’t plan on bringing world class players in, PEA would be right to insist “Well if you won’t bring in… Read more »
I”d keep auba at all cost, keep bellerin and sell AMN to fund auba’s contract if need be since AMN doesnt want to play at RB and arteta doesnt see him as a CM. I’d play auba up top and sell laca to fund partey/CM. I’d love to see a speedy front 3 of saka/auba/pepe supported with width from speedy thierny +bellerin.
The other 5 just focus on breaking legs.
To me it is as simple as: – Provide Auba with a better contract – Sell Laca (love him but he’s the expendable), Elneny and Mkhi – Buy Partey. – Get a number 10. (Coutinho on loan?) or a cheaper diamond in the rough. 2020/2021 Line up as: Bellerin/Soares Saliba/ Mustafi Mari/Luiz Tierney/Kola Xhaka/Guen Partey/Torreira New 10/Ceballos/Ozil Pepe/Nelson Auba/Nketiah Saka/Martinelli Surely the sale of Laca, Elneny and Mkhi + whatever we have in the pot can fund Partey and a loan for a new 10? Do any of you believe that under Arteta, the team above won’t get us Top… Read more »
Well, that certainly does sound very simple!
Sounds good on paper. Willock could play at ten or saka . As well as ozil. Or Smith rowe. That would save an extra transfer or loan . Tho do like the idea if countinho
I think we can offer auba a new 3 year contract worth 200-250k p/w with option to extend for 1 year.
I believe him signing a new deal is not so much dependent on the wage (dont think he’s thinking of crazy 300-400k sort of deal), but more about us spending 100-150 mil to make us competitive with the others.
Of course with kronke around we all know theres mo transfer fund.. so…. wish auba all the best and hope we can get 50 mil from inter/real/ barca for him.
Let’s be serious here, it’s not just about us. If Real Madrid or Barcelona really want to sign Auba, “persuading him to stay” is going to be a lot harder than if his choice is between Arsenal and, say, Inter, or, even worse, Everton.
And Auba knows that as well as anybody, so why would he commit now when in a few weeks he’ll be able to feel out the big clubs and see how much interest they have in him?
Auba’s position isn’t necessarily as strong as one might think. He is 31. At the end of his current contract he’ll be 32. Just the slighest drop in form or goal scoring ratio will give his suitors cold feet. He basically has just one last good contract left and its very risky for him to put that off until next year. I agree that he will weigh his options carefully and if one ore more of the super clubs really are interested he might go for that. If not, he could just as well stay with us.
So basically, he’s gone. A shame, but you can’t blame the guy. If my goals were being squandered by Mustafi making a prize dick of himself up the other end of the pitch, I’d probably want out too.
Given our current situation I personally don’t think it’s worth gambling huge wages on any single player. Would rather try and build a strong team and for the cost of Auba we could strengthen quite a few areas.
I get that supporters want him to stay but all other sporting ambitions he may have put to one side, he’s not going to re-sign unless it’s for big money and for probably 3 years MINIMUM. If the executive team agrees to that AGAIN then it’s negligence. It’s easy to state we won’t allow players to run down contracts. That may well be the ideal but the player decides. As supporters we want our top players put on big contracts to keep them. Fine but let’s not be surprised or blame the suits when we can’t then move players on.… Read more »