Full-back told he may not be allowed to leave the Emirates Stadium in the summer.
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Bacary Sagna has been told to forget about leaving Arsenal on the cheap in the summer with manager Arsene Wenger intent on keeping the defender at the Emirates Stadium.
French international right-back Sagna has been linked with a move away from north London at the end of the season, when he will have just 12 months to run on his current deal which expires at the end of the 2013/14 campaign.
But Wenger has promised to keep Sagna at the Emirates Stadium and not follow the same path he did with Robin Van Persie and Samir Nasri, who he cashed in on when both had only a year of their contracts remaining.
“He is not free in the summer so he can only leave if we let him go,” Wenger told Sky Sports. “Our desire is to keep him and he knows it.”
Sagna, who has been at Arsenal since 2007 when he joined from Auxerre, has been linked with a return back to France with big-spending Paris Saint-Germain among those interested in signing him at the end of the season.
But it appears that Wenger is willing to run the risk of losing the 30-year-old on a free transfer at the end of next season rather than sell him this summer.
Carl Jenkinson is seen as the eventual successor to Sagna at right-back, but Wenger clearly feels the young full-back is not ready to take over permanently just yet.