AS ARSENAL’s stars fly to Dubai ahead of a week of warm weather training, the chances of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang heading for the Middle East are increasingly remote.
Most of Mikel Arteta’s squad are travelling with their families today, with others joining them in the next couple of days before the hard work starts in earnest on Thursday.
But Aubameyang has almost certainly not been invited to join the party after failing to re-establish himself in the manager’s good books.
And he is highly unlikely to take up loan offers from two of Saudi Arabia’s richest clubs despite Arsenal’s willingness to release their highest paid player.
Al Nassr and Al Hilal are both prepared to pick up the tab for his £250,000-a-week basic pay and pay a fee in the region of £8million to secure a permanent move in the summer.
But Aubameyang, like Mesut Ozil before him, has made it clear that he will only leave the Emirates on his own terms and will not be forced out of the door against his wishes.
And even though his Arsenal career might be coming to an end, the 32-year-old striker still believes he can compete at the very highest level with an elite European team.
Yet the very fact that he is so far out of the picture at a club which has not scored in seven hours of football illustrates just how far his star has fallen.
@font-face{font-family:’The Sun’;src:url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Regular.woff2’) format(‘woff2’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Regular.woff’) format(‘woff’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Regular.ttf’) format(‘truetype’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Regular.svg#’) format(‘svg’);font-style:normal;font-weight:400;font-display:swap;}@font-face{font-family:’The Sun’;src:url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Medium.woff2’) format(‘woff2’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Medium.woff’) format(‘woff’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Medium.ttf’) format(‘truetype’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Medium.svg#’) format(‘svg’);font-style:normal;font-weight:500;font-display:swap;}@font-face{font-family:’The Sun’;src:url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-HeavyNarrow.woff2’) format(‘woff2’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-HeavyNarrow.woff’) format(‘woff’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-HeavyNarrow.ttf’) format(‘truetype’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-HeavyNarrow.svg#’) format(‘svg’);font-style:normal;font-weight:400;font-stretch:semi-condensed;font-display:swap;}@font-face{font-family:’The Sun’;src:url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Bold.woff2’) format(‘woff2’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Bold.woff’) format(‘woff’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Bold.ttf’) format(‘truetype’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-Bold.svg#’) format(‘svg’);font-style:normal;font-weight:700;font-stretch:normal;font-display:swap;}@font-face{font-family:’The Sun’;src:url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-HeavyNarrow.woff2’) format(‘woff2’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-HeavyNarrow.woff’) format(‘woff’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-HeavyNarrow.ttf’) format(‘truetype’),url(‘/assets/fonts/the-sun/TheSun-HeavyNarrow.svg#’) format(‘svg’);font-style:normal;font-weight:700;font-stretch:condensed;font-display:swap;}.css-qu9fel{border-top:1px solid #dcdddd;}.css-b9nmbi{margin-bottom:16px;border-top:1px solid #dcdddd;}
Most read in Football
.css-1gojmfd{margin-bottom:16px;}
BETTING SPECIAL – GET £40 IN FREE BETS ON THE AFCON
It was only 16 months ago that Arsenal were celebrating their £56million top scorer committing his future to the club until the summer of 2023.
But the ink was barely dry on that lucrative new contract before his relationship with Arteta started to come apart at the seams.
A lockdown tattoo which appeared to breach Covid protocols while visiting his sick mother in France went down like a lead balloon with Arsenal’s disciplinarian manager.
The following month he was dropped for the North London derby after constantly turning up late before contracting malaria while away on international duty with Gabon.
His commitment to the cause was further called into question when he held a birthday party for his son a week before the start of the new season and missed the opening day defeat at Brentford after contracting Covid.
And Arsenal’s patience finally snapped last month when Aubameyang reported back late from another trip to France to help his mother.
That was to prove the final straw for Arteta, who stripped Aubameyang of the captain’s armband and ordered him to train alone.
He has not been involved in Arsenal’s last ten games and hopes he could get his career back on track at the African Cup of Nations have also been scuppered by the player’s apparent disregard of protocols.
Pictured partying in a Dubai nightclub ahead of joining up with the Gabon squad, he tested positive for Covid on arriving in Cameroon and was placed into immediate isolation.
Medical tests carried out by the Gabonese medical team suggested that Aubameyang had developed ‘heart lesions’ as a result of the infection, although subsequent scans have delivered a clean bill of health.
Yet that did not stop the Gabon national coach Patrice Neveu from sending the player home without playing a single game, with his side knocked out by Burkina Faso in the contest’s quarter-finals.
And numerous reports, denied by Aubameyang, have claimed he was actually kicked out for ‘inappropriate behaviour’.
Yet even with five teenagers on the bench and a squad desperately short of numbers, Arteta did not even consider recalling Auba for their goalless draw against Burnley.
But if Arsenal are unable to sign another striker in the next seven days – and it’s beginning to look increasingly unlikely – then there still might be a shot at redemption for the wayward star.
Because it makes absolutely no sense to be paying a world class striker £250,000-a-week to stay at home when the team is struggling for goals and in danger of missing out on a top four finish.
But with Arteta adopting a ‘my way or the highway’ attitude and Aubameyang showing no signs of changing his ways, a parting of the ways is now only a matter of time.
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
