JAKARTA - Arsenal has officially renewed the contract of winger Bukayo Saka. In addition to getting a long-term contract, Saka became the player with the highest salary.
Saka showed loyalty and commitment by accepting a new contract offer from Arsenal. The 24-year-old's contract actually only ends in 2027. However, the club immediately extended the player's contract if they did not want them to be free transfer status.
Saka himself signed a five-year contract with a salary that rose to 300 thousand pounds or around 6.8 billion rupiah per week. This makes Saka the highest-paid player at the Emirates.
Meanwhile, his contract will only end in 3031. Saka also has the opportunity to become a player who spends his career at one club if Arsenal retains the player who is a product of the North London club.
If you count since entering Hale End Academy which is the club's academy in 2008, Saka has been at Arsenal since he was eight years old.
After graduating from Hale End and entering the senior team, Saka immediately became an integral part of Arsenal. However, he has not been able to give many trophies to The Gunners. At best, Arsenal only won the 2020 FA Cup and won the Community Shield trophy twice in 2020 and 2023.
On the other hand, Saka three more in a row brought Arsenal to the runner-up in the English Premier League. However, this season the England national team player has the opportunity to achieve a quadruple because he has advanced to the final of the Carabao Cup or English League Cup against Manchester City.
Arsenal are also still in the FA Cup and progressed to the fifth round after knocking out Wigan Athletic. They also qualified automatically for the Champions League 16.
In the Premier League, Arsenal is perched at the top of the standings despite only being four points ahead of Man City. Under Mikel Arteta, Arsenal hopes to end a 22-year league title drought.
Saka himself immediately scored a milestone 300th appearance with Arsenal. He has played 296 matches with 77 goals and 78 assists.
Saka is also the sixth player to have renewed his contract. Previously, the Gunners extended the contracts of William Saliba, Gabriel Magalhaes, Ethan Nwaneri and Myles Lewis-Skelly as well as teenager Max Dowman who has signed a pre-contract and a school scholarship because he is not yet 17 years old. Dowman will only sign a professional contract in December 2026 when he is 17 years old.
With the renewal of Saka's contract, Arteta breathed a sigh of relief. The reason is that he hopes the club will immediately extend the contract of the player who is the mainstay. Not only that, Saka can already play a new role in the team after the absence of a number of injured players.
Saka, until now, has often played on the wing, sometimes occupying the position as a false nine. However, recently Arteta moved him behind the striker and took the number 10 role, which can serve as an attacking midfielder or attacking midfielder. This position also allows him to be a playmaker.
Arteta chose Saka to play in that position when he lost Mikel Merino, Martin Odegaard and Kai Havertz who were injured. "We have a problem in the middle, but there are players who replace him. Bukayo is one of the players who can occupy that position. He showed a good response when playing in a different position," said Arteta as quoted by The Sun.
"It seems he can enjoy his role [as no. 10]. And this is like a challenge for him," he said again.
The English, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, and French versions are automatically generated by the AI. So there may still be inaccuracies in translating, please always see Indonesian as our main language. (system supported by DigitalSiber.id)
