Arsenal Champions League
Arsenal Champions League
A 40th birthday is when strikers start talking about next year as interviews, not matches. The body keeps going. The calendar does not.
Players who have already said goodbye to their country often treat club football as the last chapter they can still write. Every fixture becomes something to keep rather than survive.
A Champions League night against an old club makes that conversation land harder than a quiet midweek in Ligue 1.
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Olivier Giroud has told L’Equipe that this is very likely his final season as a player. The Lille forward turns 40 on Wednesday.
“On pourra faire des interviews pour L’Équipe l’année prochaine, avec plaisir, mais, comme joueur, je pense que c’est très probablement ma dernière saison. C’est pour ça que je profite de chaque instant.”
In the English version circulated by Sporting News, that reads: “As a player, I think this is very likely my last season. That’s why I’m trying to enjoy every moment. I am at peace with myself and with everything I have done in my career.”
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He will face Arsenal on 13 October in the Champions League league phase. That is a return to the club where he spent five and a half years after leaving Montpellier, who had just won Ligue 1 in 2012.
At Arsenal he won the FA Cup in 2014, 2015 and 2017. He added a fourth with Chelsea in 2018 after his January move that year, plus the Europa League in 2019 and the Champions League in 2021. He later won Serie A with Milan in 2022 and the US Open Cup with Los Angeles FC in 2024.
France received his international farewell in July 2024 after 137 caps and 57 goals. He was part of the 2018 World Cup-winning squad.
Lille sit on 10 points after five Ligue 1 games, level with Rennes just outside the podium places. Giroud is still the reference point in attack for a side that will come to the Emirates next month.
For Arsenal supporters the date is the story as much as the quote. A centre-forward who divided opinion and still scored the important cup goals is coming back as a visitor, saying the clock is almost up.
He has not announced a definite retirement date, only that another season as a player is unlikely. The full L’Equipe interview was due online later on Tuesday. Until then the line that matters is the one he chose for his birthday: enjoy every moment, because there may not be many left.