With his loan deal officially coming to an end earlier this week, Martin Odegaard has said his farewells to the Arsenal fans.

Martin Odegaard celebrating scoring for Arsenal against Olympiacos (Photo via Arsenal on Twitter)
Martin Odegaard celebrating scoring for Arsenal against Olympiacos (Photo via Arsenal on Twitter)

Although he left North London a while ago, Martin Odegaard’s loan from Real Madrid only officially ended on June 30th. In the meantime, and even still at the time of writing, his social media profiles remained covered with Arsenal pictures.

This obviously raised some fan hopes that the player was thinking about staying. He hadn’t immediately posted a farewell or updated his profile picture to one of him in a Real Madrid shirt, so at the very least he wasn’t desperate to cut ties.

Sadly, Saturday finally brought that farewell, and it has to be said that Odegaard’s message very much gave the impression that he won’t be returning this summer.

“Arsenal, thank you so much for these 6 months,” Odegaard said. “My time with the Arsenal family will always hold a special place in my heart.

“I wanna thank everyone in and around the club for the way you made me feel like a part of the family since the first day. Special thanks to the fans, even without you guys at the stadium for the majority of the season, I felt you with me at all times.

“A huge thank you to the boss and his staff for everything I’ve learned during my stay. Thank you also to all my teammates for such a great time on and off the pitch. Will miss you all. Thank you, gunners family. Always in my heart.”

Odegaard also recently confirmed to the media that Real Madrid want him back, and that the current plan is to rejoin them for pre-season training.

Even as recently as last week, reports still suggested Arsenal hadn’t given up hope of re-signing the playmaker. But it seems those chances have almost completely faded away now.

All the same, it’s a nice message from the player and a positive show of appreciation for what Arsenal gave him in his short time with the club. We wish him all the best in Madrid.