asp.net mvc - Create an ActionLink with HTML elements in the link text

Question

In an ASP.NET MVC view I'd like to include a link of the form:

<a href="blah">Link text <span>with further descriptive text</span></a>

Trying to include the <span> element in the linkText field of a call to Html.ActionLink() ends up with it being encoded (as would be expected).

Are there any recommended ways of achieving this?

Answer 1

You could use Url.Action to build the link for you:

<a href="<% =Url.Action("Action", "Controller")%>">link text <span>with further blablah</span></a>

or use Html.BuildUrlFromExpression:

<a href="<% =Html.BuildUrlFromExpression<Controller>(c => c.Action()) %>">text <span>text</span></a>