Gabriel Martinelli has signed a clause that may have ended his career at the top level

Gabriel Martinelli’s move to Al-Hilal has been confirmed.

It’s a club-record sale for Arsenal, eclipsing the £35million Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain deal from 2017 that stood for nine years.

Many fans have mixed feelings on the sale, particularly the manner in which it played out.

And now a detail has emerged that makes the whole thing feel a bit of a shame, despite the profit Arsenal have raised.

According to CBS Sports, Martinelli’s contract with Al Hilal contains a penalty clause, active until 2030, which will effectively require European clubs to pay an additional fee on top of any transfer fee if they want to bring him back to the continent.

At 25 now, that clause runs until he is 29. By the time it expires, his peak years will be behind him.

It is, in the most literal sense, a career-defining clause, and not in a good way. Watching Martinelli shine in the Champions League and in a top European league, proving the doubters wrong, feels less likely now.

It stings a little.

Gabriel Martinelli will go down as an Arsenal great

It’s fair to say Martinelli divides opinion. He always has.

The Brazilian scored just one Premier League goal last season, but by the same token, no Arsenal player scored more in the Champions League.

That sort of inconsistency, never knowing which Martinelli you were going to get, makes it feel like he never quite fulfilled the potential that made everyone so excited when he first burst onto the scene.

He joined as a raw 18-year-old from Ituano for £6million in 2019, when Arsenal were in freefall.

Along with Bukayo Saka and Emile Smith Rowe, he was a light in genuinely dark times, and gave fans something to believe in when there was not much else to cling to.

And ultimately, he was key to the trajectory that eventually delivered a Premier League title.

62 goals. 278 appearances. A Premier League winner’s medal. A Champions League final. He goes down as an Arsenal great.

It’s sad to see him go out this way, but Arsenal fans have been demanding the club get better at selling. This is what that looks like. It was the right time, the right price, and honestly the right outcome for all parties.

It will just be a shame if we never see him perform at the top level of European football again.