Seven years with the Gunners, and a tenfold return
Gabriel Martinelli left Arsenal on Thursday to join Al-Hilal. The Saudi club are paying 65 million euros, with a further 5 million in add-ons. The 25-year-old Brazilian has signed a four-year deal.
Arsenal confirmed the move on their official website, noting that the winger arrived in London in July 2019 from Ituano. His record at the club: 278 appearances in all competitions and 62 goals.
The English window had already shut at 23:59 on Tuesday. Saudi football stays open longer, which is how the deal got over the line after the UK deadline.
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Seven million in, seventy million out
The real figure that matters is elsewhere. Arsenal paid 7 million euros to sign Martinelli from his boyhood club in Brazil in 2019. Seven years later they have banked ten times that. Few Premier League signings can point to that kind of return over such a long spell.
For a club that has spent the summer trying to balance the books, the sale lands at the right time. It also closes a chapter that had been open since the start of pre-season: Martinelli was one of the names most often linked with an exit.
A glass ceiling under Arteta
On the pitch the curve had flattened out. An intermittent starter under Mikel Arteta, the Brazilian saw the competition grow stronger year after year on the left flank.
Last season made that plain enough. Arsenal got back to the top of the Premier League and reached a Champions League final, but Martinelli was left on the edges of those collective highs. The feeling grew that in this setting he had hit his limit.
His departure still leaves Arsenal with less depth in attack than before. At 25, Martinelli moves on after seven years at the top level and as one of the Saudi league’s headline signings. Al-Hilal, who have already spent big this summer, keep picking up Europe’s cast-offs while there is still value left in them.
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