Arsenal Women boss Jonas Eidevall has signed a new contract taking him to the end of the 2023/24 season. The Swede joined the club from Rosengard last summer and has overseen a guaranteed improvement in league position and points total on 2020-21 and 2019-20 with a game to spare.
The Gunners are a point behind WSL leaders Chelsea going into the final weekend of the season with a game at West Ham, while Chelsea host Manchester United. Eidevall led the team to an FA Cup Final and the Champions League quarter-final this season. It’s not where Arsenal aspire to be but it is progress.
Arsenal announced the decision to extend Eidevall’s deal jointly with the men’s team manager Mikel Arteta. Eidevall told Arsenal.com about his first campaign in charge, “Hectic and lovely, to be honest! I came here to experience and to learn new things also, and of course wanting to try and help Arsenal as much as possible.
“I think I’ve done both. I’ve learnt so much during this year, but I also think that I’ve played a little part in helping the team become a little bit better and that means we’ve been able to push for the title this year into the last game.
“Yes, they are, and of course, we want to do everything in our control to try and push for the title as much as possible. Still, the objective is the same for next season, it’s to improve, it’s to develop, it’s to push for trophies and that work is obviously always ongoing.”
It’s set to be a busy summer on the women’s side again, with six new players last summer and three new players in January. There are some key contracts still to secure, notable Caitlin Foord and Vivianne Miedema, while some fringe players whose contracts expire this summer will likely be allowed to leave. Arseblog News will speak to Jonas about his contract this afternoon.
Is there an official list of who’s contract is up in the summer? Could be a very different looking squad next year.
From what I’ve picked up, some of those names are Lydia, Jordan, Viv, Jen, Boye, Schnarderbeck & possibly Kim, Lisa, Caitlin & Fran Stenson but I could be wrong with those last 4
Kim and Jordan are already signed up for next season, to my knowledge.
I presume this means performance targets for the team have been met (or exceeded) this season (i.e. 2nd in the league, UWCL qualification, more points than last year, FA Cup semi-f, UWCL quarter-f etc).
My impression is that Miedema is more likely to leave than to stay, though it’s not 100%. What about Foord though? She’s been starting and playing quite well, why is she hesitating on signing a new deal? And do you think Arsenal will be able to keep Foord this summer, or will she be tempted by other offers, either elsewhere in the WSL or abroad?
I read that Joe wants her at Juve & that we rejected offers for her in January because Jonas wants to keep her. I think it’d be a mistake letting her go, she had a really good North London Derby
Really liked seeing the two managers side by side. Looking forward to next season but recruitment and retention of players is going to be crucial. Last year I flagged up Jule Brand as a young German player to look out for – she went on to score against us and secure a move to Wolfsburg. This year it’s Vivien Endemann. She plays for SGS Essen who are third from bottom of the Frauenbundesliga. They lost both their matches against Wolfsburg 5-1 but Vivien scored both goals (something none of our forwards could do!) Last week she ran half the length… Read more »