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From the same Guardian article that brought you news of Arsene Wenger's likely new deal with Arsenal comes this. According to the manager, we could be quite close to news on the contract situations of Bacary Sagna and Per Mertesacker, two of the most important cogs of the Arsenal machine.
"We are making good progress and hopefully we can announce something soon" sounds like a pretty good sign, and with Sagna in particular, news now is very welcome. His contract is up in the summer, so if he doesn't sign a new deal by the end of the month two things could happen, both bad. Either Wenger could decide to sell him now, to get value for a player rather than letting him leave for free, or he could simply start negotiating pre-contract deals with other teams for a summer exit. I would imagine the latter to be more likely, as without Sagna the chances of keeping Arsenal's current lofty league position are nearly nil, and we don't really need the money the same way we have in years past.
But if Wenger is correct here, it won't be an issue. Mertesacker is less of a concern, as his deal lasts until next season, but locking up two of the league's top defenders for the near future would be great for stability and great for Winning Things. And those are both things that I like, so hopefully in the next week or two we'll get a fun picture of Arsene, Bacary, and Per with pens in hand, or something like that.
