Official: Arsenal sign Takuma Asano

Serious questions Jay, who are some of the elements of the 'long line of strategic puchases' you refer to, and which of them has paid off?

Joel Campbell
Bellerin
Van Persie
Fabregas

RealGunner wrote:Joel Campbell
Bellerin
Van Persie
Fabregas

Campbell has made what, 20 something games in 5 years of being contracted to Arsenal?
That's a fail.

Bellerin and Fabregas joined as youth players. Completely different kind of transfer than to describe a 21 year old as "one for the future", "strategic puchase".
What's the strategy? What future?

Van Persie in 2004, ok sure. Back then Wenger had still a cutting edge eye for talent. Safe to say he hasn't anymore.

Not too many options out there in the market, Hans

Risk free transfer, it's not like he will be new Park, shouldnt count as this season transfer of course as we still need dat striker somewhere. My worst nightmare would be Giroud has a monster performance in Semi & Final and all well and good in the end.

Hapless_Hans wrote:

RealGunner wrote:Joel Campbell
Bellerin
Van Persie
Fabregas

Campbell has made what, 20 something games in 5 years of being contracted to Arsenal?
That's a fail.

Let's not misconstrue the facts just for the sake of making a point. Campbell was only eligible to play 3 years ago. That's when he finally got his work permit. He was loaned to Olympiacos, scored 11 in 43 and in the two seasons after, with Arsenal, he's made 40 appearances and scored 4 goals. This season he was very productive whenever he played.

Twoism wrote:Risk free transfer, it's not like he will be new Park, shouldnt count as this season transfer of course as we still need dat striker somewhere. My worst nightmare would be Giroud has a monster performance in Semi & Final and all well and good in the end.

I know a Korean who thinks Park was not given a fair shot at Arsenal because they knew he would eventually have to go home and serve his military service more so than his actual skill.

Dude's probably salty his fellow Korean wasn't good enough to start though. No problems with that over here....


Play Jaguar or you are racist FFS

We only bought Park to help out Monaco with their problems back then lol. Wasn't a football related transfer really

The timing of this signing was horrendous tbh. If you want to sign him fine, but after Arsene specifically said he would sign 2 more players (this seemingly being one of them) and most rivals have made big purchases in the past week or so, to then purchase a complete unknown will do nothing but turn people against the club.

Obviously many of you are optimistic as is a necessity when you're a Gooner and never sign who you want, but the masses will be calling for blood if we don't push on and still sign 2 players in addition to Asano. I was previously happy with our intent shown this summer but right now I would be in that latter group as well. This is the last summer for Wenger if we don't win the league next season as far as I see it, and this is coming from someone who has always backed Wenger.

Optimistic - gooners, do not compute unless u mean miserably sarcastic

Anger and resentment over this signing seems misplaced to me.

It's a relatively tiny amount of money for a player who could, in the future, prove to be worth serious consideration. The risk is very small. Will he pan out as a major player? Probably not. But possibly. Again ... the risk is very small.

I would be, well, very surprised if Wenger doesn't make another striker signing because he signed a cheap 21-year-old from the J-League who may not even be eligible to play in England right away.

Welcome to the books, Asano! Looking forward to the future.

Might buy his shirt

Chumlum wrote:
I would be, well, very surprised if Wenger doesn't make another striker signing because he signed a cheap 21-year-old from the J-League who may not even be eligible to play in England right away..

True. We all remember how signing Yaya Sanogo from the French second division was just the overture for a veritable striker sign-fest back in 2013

btw what happened to Yaya Sanogo? One for the future?

Hapless_Hans wrote:

Chumlum wrote:
I would be, well, very surprised if Wenger doesn't make another striker signing because he signed a cheap 21-year-old from the J-League who may not even be eligible to play in England right away..

True. We all remember how signing Yaya Sanogo from the French second division was just the overture for a veritable striker sign-fest back in 2013

Hans, you're missing the point - there is not necessarily a causal relationship, nor even a correlation, between Wenger punting on these young cheap players (who may not even play) and his ability or willingness to sign top class attacking talent.

2013 was the summer Wenger tried to sign Suarez for a fairly substantial fee. Suarez even wanted to join!

This summer, Wenger tried to get Vardy, who declined. Wenger may well try to get someone of equal or better quality. (He better!)

The target of Wenger/Arsenal criticism should be, perhaps, his inflexibility or inability to clinch the deal on major players ... NOT his willingness to sign, occasionally, a promising young player for little or no money to try to develop for the future. Most of those guys are not going to be stars, just like most kids brought up in a youth system aren't even going to play top flight football.

MJ wrote:

Hapless_Hans wrote:

RealGunner wrote:Joel Campbell
Bellerin
Van Persie
Fabregas

Campbell has made what, 20 something games in 5 years of being contracted to Arsenal?
That's a fail.

Let's not misconstrue the facts just for the sake of making a point. Campbell was only eligible to play 3 years ago. That's when he finally got his work permit. He was loaned to Olympiacos, scored 11 in 43 and in the two seasons after, with Arsenal, he's made 40 appearances and scored 4 goals. This season he was very productive whenever he played.

I wasn't making a dig against Campbell.
My point was that he has not much of an Arsenal career despite being contracted for the club for an eternity.
Whether it's down to him being loaned out due to work permit issues or, as last season, down to him just not being selected even somewhat regularly despite good performances - you can't pretend he has a good future, or a good present, career at your club. That's a fact, nothing misconstrued about that.
Makes no sense to buy players for a future that never really arrives, even if it's kind of right there already. Or do I misremember that most of you were perplexed with how Wenger benched Campbell right in the moment he seemed to have deserved himself a starting spot at a position where you were struggling?

Tinfoil: This transfer is some money laundering BS from Kroenke who can't steal his annual £3m from Arsenal because the Arsenal's Supporters Trust have made a big deal out of it.

Hapless_Hans wrote:
Let's not misconstrue the facts just for the sake of making a point. Campbell was only eligible to play 3 years ago. That's when he finally got his work permit. He was loaned to Olympiacos, scored 11 in 43 and in the two seasons after, with Arsenal, he's made 40 appearances and scored 4 goals. This season he was very productive whenever he played.

I wasn't making a dig against Campbell.
My point was that he has not much of an Arsenal career despite being contracted for the club for an eternity.
Whether it's down to him being loaned out due to work permit issues or, as last season, down to him just not being selected even somewhat regularly despite good performances - you can't pretend he has a good future, or a good present, career at your club. That's a fact, nothing misconstrued about that.
Makes no sense to buy players for a future that never really arrives, even if it's kind of right there already. Or do I misremember that most of you were perplexed with how Wenger benched Campbell right in the moment he seemed to have deserved himself a starting spot at a position where you were struggling?[/quote]

Not going to split hairs. It was a clarification. He's a talented player who has been underused but he has been effective. I don't think he's an example of how Wenger's eye for talent is growing weaker, for example.

It's fairly obvious why clubs buy players who have slim to no chances of making it and then loan them out. It's the same reason Chelsea have an umbrella of talent spread across Europe so that they have a De Bruyne or Lukaku to farm or sell every few seasons. It just so happens that at Arsenal, we have less.

MJ wrote:
He's a talented player who has been underused but he has been effective. I don't think he's an example of how Wenger's eye for talent is growing weaker, for example.

True, but I was asking about the strategic value of these signings. If he's underused and without future, even after overcoming the adverse odds of having been loaned around and playing himself into the team, what's the use of these kind of signings?

MJ wrote:
It's fairly obvious why clubs buy players who have slim to no chances of making it and then loan them out. It's the same reason Chelsea have an umbrella of talent spread across Europe so that they have a De Bruyne or Lukaku to farm or sell every few seasons. It just so happens that at Arsenal, we have less.

It's not obvious to me. What's the use of having these players?
You might have less than Chelsea, but still too many IMO. Thse are not youth players, no prospects. These are not for the future. I don't know why the *bleep* you'd sign players who have no perspective to play for you.

Is it strictly economical? Player trading, hoping to sell them for more? Can't imagine that's working well.

Clubs like Chelsea, as I already pointed out, see the value in it by lucking out on their loanees commanding higher fees later on. Coquelin, Wilshere, Ramsey, Szczesny for example were all signed young (or developed at the club), spent time on loan and were/are first team members.

I see it as being either economical or for the sake of strengthening the team, ideally. Either the player is good enough to make an impact once his loan time is up or he's good enough to command a fee that will represent a profit on the initial outlay. I don't agree with the extremes Chelsea take it to but I don't see how it can be that complicated.

A couple of goals scored by Asano today:

https://twitter.com/jvella7gooner/status/751749282978467840

https://twitter.com/jvella7gooner/status/751749424141987840

Can we get a work permit for him? Atleast he'll be a differemt option to Giroud.

First goal is classic jaguar.

Second goal amazing

Absolute shit effort by Sanfrecce though. Getting trashed on garutoo radio

Looks elite tbh

Asano getting a great send-off:

https://twitter.com/ScoutedFootball/status/754695965232070656