Transfer Centre

Arsenal 'plan fresh contract talks'

By Neil Wilkes, Editor-in-chief | 04 September 2017

Arsenal are reportedly planning to hold talks with a number of their key players with contracts expiring at the end of next season.

Arsenal are reportedly planning to hold contract talks with several of their key players in the next few months to avoid any uncertainty next summer.

The futures of players Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Alexis Sanchez and Mesut Ozil dominated the headlines for the latter half of last season as the club failed to thrash out fresh terms for the trio.

Oxlade-Chamberlain reportedly turned down a pay increase worth £180,000 a week to accept a less lucrative deal at Liverpool, while both Sanchez and Ozil are now into the final 12 months of their contracts and face the prospect of leaving for free next year.

According to The Telegraph, the Gunners are determined not to be in the same situation next year and are planning to begin talks with players who are out of contract at the end of the 2018-19 season.

The newspaper says that Aaron Ramsey, Petr Cech, Danny Welbeck, Nacho Monreal and Theo Walcott have all been earmarked by the Arsenal board for important talks this side of Christmas, while they will renew their efforts to resign Sanchez and Ozil.

The pair are thought to have rejected Arsenal's most recent offer of £280,000 a week - more than double their current remuneration - but the club are unlikely to significantly enhance their proposals before the end of the season.