Michael Owen believes there’s no reason for Alexis to stay at Arsenal, while Robbie Savage claims Arsenal are a “million miles” away from the Premier League title.

BT Sport have a quality set of pundits, don’t they?

Arsenal defeated Brighton 2-0 on Sunday and Alexis Sanchez happened to have a good second half where he set-up a goal. Naturally, whenever Alexis is brought up, so is his future at Arsenal.

The expectation is that Alexis will leave the club when his contract runs out in the summer, and Michael Owen feels there is no reason for the Chilean to remain at the club.

“If he’s interested in securing himself for the rest of his life financially, he’ll leave,” Owen told BT Sport (via The Metro).

“If he’s interested in winning medals then he’ll leave.

“There’s no way possible that he can stay in my eyes.

“He jumps off the page. He jumps into any Premier League team. And when you look at some of the teams we’ve got at the minute, they’re brilliant, yet he’d walk into any team. He is that good.

“And I’d be astonished if you see him in an Arsenal shirt next season.

“In many ways, why would you want to be that quality of player and not playing in the Champions League regularly and challenging for the league title? So you can understand it in a way.”

Few will argue that Alexis could very easily move on to bigger and better things.

However, there are two things worth pointing out.

One is that Arsenal were prepared to make Alexis set for life financially (if he isn’t already), the other is that this is the first time in nearly two decades that Arsenal are without Champions League football. He also could have won the Premier League title with Arsenal during the 2015/16 season, a season where he didn’t perform as well as he could have.

Robbie Savage gave his two cents on the issue. He believes Alexis wants to win major honours and that Arsenal are a “million miles” from that.

“It’s the perfect situation for Alexis Sanchez, he knows every time he goes onto that pitch in an Arsenal shirt, he’s in the shop window,” Savage said.

“I’m sure every team around the world will want Alexis Sanchez on a free transfer.

“Whether he goes in January is another thing. That backheel today is world-class and the thing is he works exceptionally hard for his side.

“If it’s in January or at the end of the season – he wants to win trophies. I know Arsenal have won two FA Cups in recent years but, you know, Premier Leagues, Champions Leagues and I think Arsenal are a million miles away from that.”

It’s unlikely that Arsenal will win the Premier League this season, but for all their detractors, they are currently level on points with last season’s champions Chelsea, one point behind media darlings Tottenham and above Liverpool.

If Arsenal are a million miles away, what about those clubs?

The gap between Arsenal and the top of the table is six points. With 31 games left to play, that means very little.