Mikel Arteta - Arsenal
A midfielder signed for a club-record fee is usually tied down again before the original contract becomes a talking point. Two years left, plus an option, is still enough time. Opening talks anyway is how a club shows he is no longer a project.
Wages then follow the players already on the top band. The number is the message. The length is the plan.
Workload sits next to that. A new deal and a rest from international week can happen in the same month.
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Football Transfers reports that Declan Rice is close to a new five-year Arsenal contract worth around £280,000 a week. Steve Kay’s exclusive says the club already has a one-year option on the deal that runs to 2028, but still wants fresh terms.
Arsenal paid West Ham about £105million for him in 2023. A five-year agreement would take him into his early thirties and put him among the highest earners at the club. Bukayo Saka’s latest deal has been reported at about £300,000 a week.
There are no quotes from Rice or Mikel Arteta in the report. The case being made is role as much as money. He arrived as a destroyer and now plays deeper, higher and at set pieces. Last season he made 69 appearances for club and country and later said he had played through pain. Arsenal are managing that load.
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🚨Declan Rice is set to sign a new long-term contract with Arsenal until 2031.
Mikel Arteta views the midfielder as one of the club’s most important assets. pic.twitter.com/htUsbxBhfg
— now.arsenal (@now_arsenaI) September 22, 2026
He withdrew from Thomas Tuchel’s England squad this week after playing the full 90 minutes in the 3-0 defeat at Brighton. That sits beside the contract talk rather than against it.
This season he has five Premier League games, two assists and no goals, plus a Champions League appearance. The numbers are not the reason for the raise. Continuity after a first title in 22 years is.
Arteta has already agreed his own improved deal. William Saliba signed until 2030 last year. Saka is locked in. Rice is the next midfield name on that list, with Martin Odegaard’s deal running to 2028.
£280,000 a week is still a report, not an announcement. Five years is the figure attached to it. Until the club confirm the terms, the Football Transfers line is that an agreement is close and the option in 2028 is no longer the plan they want to rely on.
For supporters the practical point is simpler. The player who cost £105million is not being allowed to drift into the last 18 months. Arsenal are paying to keep the midfield they built the title around.
Kai Havertz
Kai Havertz