Arsenal are desperate to tie down the duo to a new contract, and Arsene Wenger has insisted that the negotiations are not all about the money.
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Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger believes Chinese representatives are in touch with Alexis Sanchez. On my side, the best position is to negotiate.
“We live in a world where great players like Alexis and Ozil earn a lot of money”.
“I believe it yes, why not?”
Both players have just 18 months left on their contract, so the situation is becoming increasingly urgent – and it seems Arsenal have now taken a stance on whether they’ll be held to ransom or not. But why should you go to China today when you play in England? I think we need to score goals, especially against a team like Arsenal. “Hopefully they’ll stay for longer than that”.
And this has captured the attention of Conte, who is eager to play him alongside Diego Costa in what could be a dream combination for the Blues in years to come.
Like Ozil, Sanchez is in talks over a new contract. “We have big games but overall I’m happy with the way we have behaved and the consistency of our desire”. But that does not affect the speed of negotiations or decision making.
“When a guy is in a good success and good confidence, it is more risky to stop him than keep him going”, he said. It is always difficult to work out what is physical and what is mental [in terms of fatigue], and predicting who is exhausted and who is not can be hard. It’s hard to give you an assessment on that.
The German World-Cup victor has been ever-present in Arsenal’s team having featured in 13 Premier League games this season and in every single one of the team’s Champions League fixtures. They must win at St Jakob-Park and hope European minnows Ludogorets pull off one of the biggest shocks in Champions League history in Paris.
It is hard to see what else the Arsenal manger could have said.
If Arsenal finish second, they would face one of Napoli, Barcelona, Atletico Madrid, Borussia Dortmund, Monaco or Juventus in the next round.
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Arsenal are now second on the EPL table with 31 points from 14 matches, three points behind fellow London outfit Chelsea.
