Bacary Sagna

Bacary Sagna (born 14 February 1983) is a French former professional footballer who played as a right back and is mostly known for his time at Arsenal.

He also played for the France national football team.

Sagna's former manager at Arsenal, Arsène Wenger, once described him as the best right-back in the Premier League.

In addition to him regularly featuring as a wing-back, he played as a centre-back for Arsenal on several occasions.

He provided many assists though, his most important contribution arguably being the cross to striker Nicklas Bendtner, who gave Arsenal the 1–0 lead in the 94th minute against Wolverhampton Wanderers.

Despite this, however, Sagna was linked away from the club with various teams, including Serie A's Internazionale, seemingly interested in taking the defender away from London.

Sagna scored his first goal at the Emirates Stadium for Arsenal against Celtic, a game in which Arsenal went on to win 3–2 and win the Emirates Cup for the second consecutive year.

He played for their youth team until 1998.

In 1998, he moved to AJ Auxerre's youth team.

Eventually, he was promoted to the first team and he made 87 Ligue 1 appearances for them.

He was part of the squad that won the Coupe de France in 2005.

He also played in the UEFA Cup in each of his three seasons with the club's first team, making a total of 17 appearances in the competition.

He was also voted into the Ligue 1 team of the season for his outstanding displays at the right back position.

He played in the same Auxerre team as Abou Diaby, a future Arsenal teammate, and Watford centre-back Younès Kaboul.

Sagna established himself as one of the best full backs of the French top tier and thus became dubbed "Mr. Reliable" by the club's fans.

He also won Auxerre's Player of the Year award for the 2006–07 season.

Sagna began his career at Auxerre, before transferring to Arsenal for £7 million in 2007.

A full international from 2007 to 2016, he was selected by France for two FIFA World Cup tournaments and one UEFA European Championship.

Sagna started his career at FC Sens.

On 12 July 2007, Sagna completed a move to Arsenal from Auxerre for an undisclosed fee, thought to have been an initial €9 million that could have risen to €11 million.

He was given the number 3 shirt, previously worn by former defender Ashley Cole.

Sagna made his debut for Arsenal on 19 July 2007 as a starter in the squad that beat Turkish club Gençlerbirliği 3–0 in a friendly at Austria's Bad Waltersdorf Stadion.

On 13 February 2008, exactly one week before Arsenal were set to play the second leg of their round of 16 encounter against Milan in the Champions League, Sagna's older brother, Omar Sagna, died at the age of 28, one day before his birthday.

He, however, did play the match after he was advised to by his father.

Arsenal went on to win the second leg 0–2 with the same scoreline on aggregate.

On 23 March, Sagna tallied his first Premier League goal off a low header from a corner kick to give Arsenal a 1–0 lead against London rivals Chelsea at Stamford Bridge, but later went off injured before Chelsea came back to win the game 2–1.

At the end of the season, he was named in the PFA Team of the Year.

Sagna signed a new deal with Arsenal before the start of the 2008–09 season.

He made his 100th league start for Arsenal on 3 October 2010, a 2–0 defeat against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge.

On 14 November, he scored only his second ever official goal for Arsenal in a 2–1 away victory against Everton at Goodison Park, with a powerful shot from the near post.

On 8 December 2010, Sagna picked up his first red card in his Arsenal career in a 3–1 home victory against Serbian club Partizan in Arsenal's final Champions League group game of the season.

On 1 January 2011, in a match with Birmingham City, he was involved in an incident where Lee Bowyer stamped on him after Sagna had gone in for a tackle.

Bowyer was banned by the FA for three games for the stamp.

On 5 January, Sagna picked up his second red card of the season after he and Manchester City fullback Pablo Zabaleta headbutted each other in the final moments of Arsenal's 0–0 draw with City at Emirates Stadium.

On 19 January, Sagna scored his second goal of the season with Arsenal's second goal in their 3–1 victory over Leeds United at Elland Road in a third round replay.

In 2014, shortly after winning the FA Cup, his first trophy at the club, he made a move to Manchester City.

Arsenal signed him for a further two years, taking his contract up to 2014.

Sagna stated, "I love Arsenal, it's a great club," and further added, "The manager is also very good and next season we will be fighting for all the trophies."

He stunningly saved Arsenal in a 2–2 draw against Aston Villa when he jumped and kicked the ball away so that Arsenal would go into half time with the lead.

Sagna struggled to replicate his form from the previous two seasons as injuries also prevented him from contributing to the team in the same way.