FM2011: talking players out of retirement. Can I do it?

So I've just started a save with Man U and would quite like to talk Edwin Van der Sar out of retiring, there's no real need since I've set up the De Gea transfer for the end of the season but I'd quite like VDS to have at least one more year, providing cover and competiton for De Gea whilst tutoring some of the youngsters. I'm sure this used to be an option in previous games but I can't find a private chat option for it, so is it gone from the game or was I wrong to assume it was a private chat thing?