In the aftermath of Saturday’s 3-1 win over Sp*rs, William Saliba revealed that Arsenal had contacted his representatives about extending his contract.
“They talk a little bit,” said the France international whose current deal ends in 2024. Given his incredible ‘start’ to life at Emirates Stadium, it’s hardly a surprise we want to tie him down.
All across Europe, big clubs are monitoring the defender’s situation, as they have been doing with Bukayo Saka and Gabriel Martinelli.
Thankfully, on all three fronts, things sound positive from a Gunners’ perspective. The England international has hinted he’ll put pen to paper soon while the Brazilian is on record saying he’d like to stay at Arsenal forever.
“Obviously we have to plan for the future,” said Arteta on Thursday. “We’re all working on it, obviously Edu is on top of it and all the board.
“We’ll try to do things in the right way, being fair and trying to plan in the best possible way and reward the players that in our opinion have a big future for the club. When we have something to announce, we will do that.”
Since they started working together in December 2019, Arteta and Edu have been doing what they can to give themselves more room for manoeuvre when it comes to contract negotiations.
While improving and cleansing the squad has proved difficult and expensive they are edging closer to a situation where more often than not talks can happen two years rather than 12 months in advance.
It looks as though we’re learning from past mistakes, although Arteta didn’t want to be critical of predecessors when asked if the club was finally out of the habit of letting players go into the final year of the contracts.
“I don’t know. Every player is different, what happened in the past, for sure, the people that were in charge had the right reasons or tried something that was beneficial for the club.
“We will try to do the same thing and ensure that the club is always protected, that the club is always in a position to move forward and the players are happy to be at the club.”
Sign da ting!
I just did!
Got to get Saliba signing, he is a big difference maker in defence. Plus the other two obviously, we need all three.
Saliba situation already has me stressed and there is no reason for him not to wait until the last possible minute. This will be hell.
Hate to say it but I think Our pants will be pulled down with Saliba, the very top clubs are already circling just hope we’ll get a substantial fee for a player who looks well on his way to being the very best in his position.
I think he might wait to be sure we have UCL next year but we will and I think he will sign up. There may have been some mistakes in our handling of Saliba early on but he can’t be anything but pleased with how things have gone for his career in the last 3 years. London is a great place to play and to make money, and we have a special group that is going to the very top.
Looking at the small sample size there doesn’t seem to be a ceiling height for him and everyone of us would love him to sign up for the long haul
The bottom line is nobody knows what they’ll do, or will probably do, except the players and the people around them. No doubt they are all receiving “indications” of interest, legally or illegally, from other clubs so it’s all down to them/their advisors. Others have mentioned qualification for the CL as being a factor in one or more of the three. It could be, but I’m not convinced the club will wait until/unless we do qualify. If one or more do decide to leave it will obviously be a huge blow which is bound to have a negative impact on… Read more »
Since when have Arsenal ever sold a key player unless he pushed to leave? We have never been a selling club.
Almost never 😂
I still haven’t gotten over Anelka leaving, I was convinced he would be the best striker in the world.
Haha I was literally just thinking that.. then I started wondering did anelka being replaced by Henry make me think we’d constantly have anelka/Henry type strikers as youngin. Just watching rafa lea for ac Milan thinking he’d be the perfect raw talent for wenger to polish
RVP still stings me. All those years watching him be a bit shit or injured. We finally got one and a half electric seasons before he fucked off and won those Manc tits the title almost single handed. Urgh.
Good god now I’m on one.
Fabregas being fellated by Barca players while on international duties.
Henry being wooed constantly for 2 years.
I just sicked up in my mouth. Fuck you Barcelona. Enjoy bankruptcy.
As the article mentions, Arteta is too diplomatic to be critical of predecessors letting players go into the final year of their contracts, but I don’t think we should be. It was totally unnecessary and blo*dy stupid – and it cost the club a fortune in lost transfer fees or forced it to pay OTT wages to get the player to stay. I’m not aware of anything like that being repeated like we did it at other “big” clubs. It’s a habit that we’re well rid of thank goodness. As to our trio of “will they, won’t they” players, I… Read more »
Letting contracts run down gives good players all the power, why wouldn’t they do it?
Arteta is such an intelligent man. Gives the press absolutely nothing to scandalise, and for sure, they’ll all have their knives out for him.
Martinelli and Saka will 100% sign up and I 100%hope that Big Willie does the same.
Wouldn’t it be something if Arsenal announced on Christmas Day morning that Martinelli, Saka, and Saliba had all signed new contracts.
Even at the end of the article arteta is not saying a bad word about the previous people that made obvious mistakes. This my friends is the making of a world class manager. Humble, respectful and focusing on our own things. Superb work mik
Mikel – total class. Learned from the prof.
When you recruit the right players and they are consistently performing at a top level, there is no need of delaying in extending their contracts. But when a player is not performing at the highest level, you don’t have option than to move the player on or allow him to run down his contract. Above all, Arsenal’s recruitments processes have been awesome in the past 3 seasons