Despite the distinct possibility of Ashley Cole, Thierry Henry and Robert Pires signing off on their Arsenal careers after tomorrow night’s Champion’s League final, Arsene Wenger believes that a golden era is about to commence at the club and has indicated that he could be persuaded to extend his stay at the club beyond the two years he has left on his current contract.

Wenger told The Sun:

“And do I see myself finishing my coaching career in charge of Arsenal? Yes.

“I must admit that I’ve no ambition to be the coach of an international team.

“In fact it’s the opposite. At a club like this you have the cream of the world’s football talent to spot, sign and develop - and what could be more challenging than that?”

“Yet if you are a national team coach you’ve only got what the country’s generation of players provides for you. If you’ve got a bad bunch then what can a coach do about it?

“Every time I sign a young kid the parents ask me whether I’m going to stay or not and I always point out I’ll definitely see out my contract.

“Now I feel I’m beginning all over again at Arsenal, that a special new era is commencing.”

Whether a victory in tomorrow night’s battle against Barcelona would be enough to persuade his star striker to stay is another matter and even Wenger doesn’t know exactly what Thierry Henry has on his mind when it comes to deciding where he will play his football next season.

Keep an eye out for Henry swapping shirts at the end of the game though, it could be an early premonition of next season at the Nou Camp on the Stade de France pitch.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 16th, 2006 at 9:23 am and is filed under Arsenal. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. Both comments and pings are currently closed.