MANCHESTER United's Dimitar Berbatov will have his contract extended until the end of next season, laying to rest any doubts about the club's desire to keep a player who has slipped further out of contention.
The 31-year-old's existing contract ends this summer but a "one-way" option enables United to extend it by a year at any time until it expires.
They will do so this month, which means Berbatov will be a part of Alex Ferguson's squad until June 2013 unless another club comes in for him in the next two transfer windows.
The one-year extension is understood not yet to have been signed, though United will invoke the option. Ferguson said of Berbatov's future before his strong first half in United's 2-1 defeat to Ajax last week: "I think we resolved that -- that he will be here next year."