Martin Odegaard wins Arsenal Player of the Year award

Arsenal skipper Martin Odegaard has won the club’s Player of the Year award for the recently-concluded 2022-23 season.

After finishing second in the Premier League table last time out, the Gunners had several players to thank for securing a long-awaited return to Champions League football.

Probably the most important of them all was Odegaard, who played a key role for Mikel Arteta’s men, notching up an impressive 15 goals and seven assists in 37 league games.

Last season’s Player of the Year Bukayo Saka and Gabriel Martinelli also enjoyed fine individual campaigns with 25 and 20 direct goal contributions respectively. It was no surprise to see them finish second and third behind Odegaard in the voting this time around.

Off the back of his heroics last time out, Odegaard is in line to be rewarded with a new Arsenal contract and the 24-year-old is confident he and his teammates can come back even stronger next season.

“Last season we had a difficult end when we dropped out of the Champions League but we used that anger and came back stronger this year, and we need to do the same thing again,” Odegaard was quoted saying by Football.London.

“With the position we’ve been in all season, we are not happy with second place even though it’s a good achievement and probably everyone would have taken it before the season – we wanted to win it when we got into that position.

“It is a good sign that we are disappointed, and I think we should be. We could have won the league, so let’s use this disappointment in a good way, learn from it and make sure it doesn’t happen the same next season.”

Odegaard is currently on international duty with the Norway national team after which he will return to Arsenal for the start of pre-season. If anyone is lucky enough to own a season ticket or secure a last-minute arsenal ticket, they’re in for a treat watching Odegaard on the pitch in the next season.