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The Goon Thread

indianspur said:
im sorry but thats just not right. Of course Wenger knew about Cazorla, Wenger probably knows all about the new Cazorla who is only 11 years old at the moment.

probably what Wenger didnt know was the immediate availability of Cazorla because of the money problems at Malaga and the fact that he could get the player for a ridiculously low sum of 14 mill. I mean, 14 mill was bargain time and even someone as spendthrift as Wenger jumped on it immediately

wenger didnt know about Cazorla? :lol: just makes McGarry look like a mug
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Agreed. If he didn't know much about Cazorla why would he sign him up so quickly just because a journalist said he was available? Makes no sense.

Modric THFC said:
More of a famed knowledge of players across France.
Wenger hasnt made an otu of nowhere bargain signing for years.
Song for 1m in 06/07. And Sagna and Diarra the season after.
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Sagna wasn't an out of nowhere bargain signing. A great signing for them for sure, but he wasn't unknown and he wasn't cheap either. You're talking about Lass Diarra from Chelsea? I don't think he was all that unknown either, there were plenty of Spurs fans that really wanted us to sign him I think.

His scattergun approach signing up talented youngsters from around the world that was part of what (deservedly) got him his reputation hasn't worked well for them in recent years after some substantial success earlier in his Arsenal career. No doubt they have a wide reaching scouting network, and they do sign a lot of unknown youngsters, but they haven't been great at developing them. I'm sure Wenger also knows a lot about a lot of senior players, but his signings have been hit and miss at best, especially when the fees have been higher.
 
Considering all the media hype we used to be subjected to over Wenger kids year in year out and how next year they would win something, they havent done that well have they
 
Arsene Wenger, BBC's Ian McGarry and the purchase of Santi Cazorla

I think this issue needs to be clarified with direct quotes from McGarry. On the podcast download they discuss the top 4 and Arsenal clinching it from around 33mins (52mins on the iPlayer). McGarry and Claridge ponder whether it would have been better for them to finish outside the top 4.

McGarry then talks about Arsene and his spending ways, and that the ammout to spend may be not relevant as Wenger is afraid to go out of his comfort zone in terms of purchasing players:

“The problem is Wenger [in terms of spending and what is bought]. He’s never been great at signing a player he doesn’t know well. All the best players he’s signed are those he’s worked with before: Henry, Vieira, Anelka, Petit etc. The players he’s bought have been very hit-and-miss in the interim period and you have to say that Giroud and Podolski have not been the success they were expected to be this season. OK but not brilliant. Wenger’s never spent more than 24m, and here’s another example: Santi Cazorla. Santi Cazorla joined because of an anomaly. He joined because a journalist in Spain phoned Arsene up and said “Malaga have a tax bill of 17M Euros they need to pay by tomorrow (like Monreal); if you give 17m to Malaga today you get Santi Cazorla. Wenger said hmm that sounds good. He asked a few people about Santi Cazorla, they all said ‘yeah he’s quite a good player’ and so they got him.”

McGarry goes on to say that he admires Wenger on the whole especially the 16 years constant CL qualification, but says that he’s been a bit hit or miss more recently and not as cutting edge as he was before (when he mainly basd his transfers on French players he knew well) and that Gizidis’ quotes of “We are not solely interested in finishing top 4 but expect to challenge for trophies” was perhaps a line on the sand being drawn by the board to put Wenger on notice that he has to change.

So I think some of you are being a bit dismissive of McGarry and what he says about how they came to buy Santi Cazorla (probably because you had not actually listened, my bad that I didn’t quite give the right details, eg it was not the last 10 mis of the podcast – that was for the Modric possibly back to Spurs bit).
Surely his hit-and-miss transfer record shows that he is NOT all that knowledgeable about players beyond the French league or outside of those he has worked with before.

To automatically assume that Wenger DID know about Santi Cazorla before purchasing him and that McGarry is talking gonad*s suggests you've forgotten how hit-and-miss Wenger's purchases have been in the last 5/6 years: Arshavin, Nasri, Vermaelen, Chamakh, Koscielny, Squillacci, Gervinho, Mertesacker, Arteta, PARK CHU-YOUNG, ANDRE SANTOS, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Monreal, Giroud, Podolski, Cazorla.
I think it perfectly plausible that he DID NOT know about Santi Cazorla and that he was give a very lucky 'heads up' by the Spanish journalist. Put it this way: why didn't he buy Cazorla the moment he kew Fabregas was leaving like he bought Podolski and Giroud when he knew deep down that RVP was leaving?
 
If he didn't know about Santi Cazorla than the guy is a fudging macaron. It'd be like not knowing who Isco is right this moment. Cazorla has been highly rated for years, even before he went to Arsenal. He didn't buy him because he saw Wheelchair as Fabregas' replacement, then he got injured and he probably realised Wheelchair wasn't as much as a goal threat as Fabregas and it has been proven. I mean he was also in for Mata too the season before last but he chose the money at Chelsea remember.
 
Mumorn said:
If he didn't know about Santi Cazorla than the guy is a fudging macaron. It'd be like not knowing who Isco is right this moment. Cazorla has been highly rated for years, even before he went to Arsenal. He didn't buy him because he saw Wheelchair as Fabregas' replacement, then he got injured and he probably realised Wheelchair wasn't as much as a goal threat as Fabregas and it has been proven. I mean he was also in for Mata too the season before last but he chose the money at Chelsea remember.
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Wheelchair was injured long before Fabregas left the club; June 2011 after Egland duty. Fabregas left that August when they also lost Nasri, but Fabregas was known to be going long before that. They were in for Mata and then we bid to trigger the release clause (thus scuppering that deal, as we knew that he wouldn't come to us and that they didn't want to pay the full whack, heheh Levy:lol:) and almost forced them to bow down to Chelski.

BTW, Arsenal were Mata's first choice, he wanted to play for them instead of Chelski. This was common knowledge. I think that's why Mata plays like a 'wronged-child' whenever he plays Arsenal: ALWAYS has a blinder, playing even better than normal.


If they really knew about Cazorla that would have been the time to buy him as a back-up plan gto missing out on Mata. Of course they didn't and I beleive it was because they didn't know much about Cazorla.

Don't know why this is so shockig anyhow; he bought Park-Chu Young, Gervinho and Andre Santos in the same window FFS
 
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Gervinho come off the back of a very successful season with Lille in which he outclassed Hazard, in hindsight yeah it has looked like a poor transfer, but at the time it looked a decent buy. But he really just isn't cut out in the league, a case where someone looked good in the French league but has flopped massively in English football.. Park was also promising, I believe Arsenal and Wenger still hold him in high regard too.

Andre Santos was just strange to be honest, if it was a free or something I'd understand as they needed cover at left back but to pay £5,000,000 for him was pathetic. They won't even get anywhere near that for him now neither. I always thought since they haven't won trophies and got the new stadium Wenger has sort of put things on the back burner for a bit and looked for bargain here and there to sell on for profit (even if they werent even first team plans or necessarily players who are rated highly) just so he can help pay off the stadium and THEN start paying big.
 
Mumorn said:
Gervinho come off the back of a very successful season with Lille in which he outclassed Hazard, in hindsight yeah it has looked like a poor transfer, but at the time it looked a decent buy. But he really just isn't cut out in the league, a case where someone looked good in the French league but has flopped massively in English football.. Park was also promising, I believe Arsenal and Wenger still hold him in high regard too.

Andre Santos was just strange to be honest, if it was a free or something I'd understand as they needed cover at left back but to pay £5,000,000 for him was pathetic. They won't even get anywhere near that for him now neither. I always thought since they haven't won trophies and got the new stadium Wenger has sort of put things on the back burner for a bit and looked for bargain here and there to sell on for profit (even if they werent even first team plans or necessarily players who are rated highly) just so he can help pay off the stadium and THEN start paying big.
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Yeah, I was gutted they got Gervinho at the time as I thought he would be a good player for either of us.
But Gervinho flop, Park and paying 6.8M for Andre Santos shows that Wenger really may not know what he's doing half the time and certainly makes it VERY plausible that he did not know about Cazorla until he got that call from the Spanish journo and THEN asked others about him...
 
glorygloryeze said:
Yeah, I was gutted they got Gervinho at the time as I thought he would be a good player for either of us.
But Gervinho flop, Park and paying 6.8M for Andre Santos shows that Wenger really may not know what he's doing half the time and certainly makes it VERY plausible that he did not know about Cazorla until he got that call from the Spanish journo and THEN asked others about him...
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I just find it impossible to believe that Wenger wouldn't know about Cazorla. I mean he's been highly rated since he's Villarreal days. Maybe he was looking at Cazorla but Malaga signed him and he obviously couldn't buy him so waited until the following season or maybe he didn't realise how good Cazorla was. It just doesn't seem right that he'd know who Gervinho was etc but not Cazorla.
 
Mumorn said:
I just find it impossible to believe that Wenger wouldn't know about Cazorla. I mean he's been highly rated since he's Villarreal days. Maybe he was looking at Cazorla but Malaga signed him and he obviously couldn't buy him so waited until the following season or maybe he didn't realise how good Cazorla was. It just doesn't seem right that he'd know who Gervinho was etc but not Cazorla.
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It does if you remember he knows a lot about the French league and it was purchases here that built his rep as being an astute manager in the transfer market in the first place
 
Mumorn said:
That actually completely skipped my mind. He also had Toure and Eboue at the time too who were both Ivorians.

I did find this though:

http://metro.co.uk/2011/07/23/arsenal-to-rival-malaga-for-santi-cazorla-transfer-89524/
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Hmmm...hadn't seen that before. Very interesting. On the one hand it shows that Cazorla was known to Arsenal before this summer but on the other hand Arsenal paid 17m in summer 2012 for him when they could have paid 17m the previous summer. Suggests that McGarry was partly right and perhaps instead of asking pals "is he a good player?" after the journo called, he actually asked "is he stilla good player?" Shouldn't Wenger have already known how he'd done in the year since they intially looked at him?

Still suggests to me that overall McGarry has got it right in that Wenger's purchases are very random these days; Cazorla has probably been Wenger's best buy for years (Arsenal fans certainly think so) and that came about from a random phonecall from a journo and NOT directly chasing/scouting a player.
 
glorygloryeze said:
Wheelchair was injured long before Fabregas left the club; June 2011 after Egland duty. Fabregas left that August when they also lost Nasri, but Fabregas was known to be going long before that. They were in for Mata and then we bid to trigger the release clause (thus scuppering that deal, as we knew that he wouldn't come to us and that they didn't want to pay the full whack, heheh Levy:lol:) and almost forced them to bow down to Chelski.

BTW, Arsenal were Mata's first choice, he wanted to play for them instead of Chelski. This was common knowledge. I think that's why Mata plays like a 'wronged-child' whenever he plays Arsenal: ALWAYS has a blinder, playing even better than normal.


If they really knew about Cazorla that would have been the time to buy him as a back-up plan gto missing out on Mata. Of course they didn't and I beleive it was because they didn't know much about Cazorla.

Don't know why this is so shockig anyhow; he bought Park-Chu Young, Gervinho and Andre Santos in the same window FFS
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he didnt buy Cazorla back then when looking to replace Fabregas because he didnt want to pay 19 mill pounds which is what Malaga paid!!! with Wenger its all about money and value. Same with Mata, who cost 24 mill when he moved to Chelsea and was always rated in that price range. Just too expensive for Wenger

He jumped at buying Cazorla last summer because the overall deal cost around 12 mill. Wenger treats the scum money as his own, he will always go for the cheaper option rather than being pressurized into spending big by the fans and media. With Cazorla and Monreal he got lucky because of Malaga's financial problems

I laugh when i see Arse linked with someone like Benteke.....il tell you now, he wot go anywhere near Benteke whilst figures of anything north of 15 mill is being mentioned. He will rather give his cheap new signing Sanogo a chance rather that buy Benteke for a stupidly high sum.
 
glorygloryeze said:
Hmmm...hadn't seen that before. Very interesting. On the one hand it shows that Cazorla was known to Arsenal before this summer but on the other hand Arsenal paid 17m in summer 2012 for him when they could have paid 17m the previous summer. Suggests that McGarry was partly right and perhaps instead of asking pals "is he a good player?" after the journo called, he actually asked "is he stilla good player?" Shouldn't Wenger have already known how he'd done in the year since they intially looked at him?

Still suggests to me that overall McGarry has got it right in that Wenger's purchases are very random these days; Cazorla has probably been Wenger's best buy for years (Arsenal fans certainly think so) and that came about from a random phonecall from a journo and NOT directly chasing/scouting a player.
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too many inaccuracies in what McGarry was saying for him to be taken seriously. Like when he said that Wenger had worked with Vieira and Anelka before signing them for Arse. No he hadnt!!.

yes he targets the French market mostly, well he is French and over the years they have produced some great players. However recently the quality has dried up and Wenger himself is struggling to find decent players there.

Wenger is not a genius in the transfer market, but he is not a mug either. He is average, and cheap, and in in some ways this has helped Spurs close the gap in recent years because he has given us the chance by not sufficiently strengthening his side.
 
glorygloryeze said:
Yeah, I was gutted they got Gervinho at the time as I thought he would be a good player for either of us.
But Gervinho flop, Park and paying 6.8M for Andre Santos shows that Wenger really may not know what he's doing half the time and certainly makes it VERY plausible that he did not know about Cazorla until he got that call from the Spanish journo and THEN asked others about him...
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here is a report from a man to be trusted. Spanish football expert Sid Lowe. He wrote this back in 2011 when Cazorla moved to Malaga and here he talks about Wenger. So Wenger was looking at Cazorla and Mata at being Fabregas replacements. Why did he decide against bidding? money of course. He knew the likes of Malaga and Chelsea would outbid his low offers i guess

And yet, it didn't. And yet, it sometimes feels like people have not always rated him as highly as those who come into contact with him do. Cazorla, like Juan Mata, was on Arsenal's shortlist this summer but ultimately Arsene Wenger decided against bidding. Nor did any other Premier League club. Real Madrid were close to signing him in 2008, but not since. Barcelona were not interested.



http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/writers/sid_lowe/10/05/santi.cazorla/index.html

Cazorla was a player who even Barca and Real didnt want to take a risk on! this is what shocked everyone. And it was former Villareal manager Pellegrini that took that chance at Malaga. Why? because he knew the player, in some way like Wenger knows French players.

what is unbelievable is how much Cazorla's size was a concern to top clubs and managers
 
Cazorla rejected Madrid when he was at Villareal so that might have played a part in Madrid not wanting to make a bid. Villareal accepted a bid but Cazorla turned them down.
 
Ian McGarry's article is full of nonsense tbh.
Murmon's article proves it all. And im sure if you look at the Arsenal online forums, there'd be plenty of links of Cazorla to Arsenal during the end his Villareal days.
To even think/suggest that Wenger did not know of Cazorla is beyond belief frankly. He has been a member of the Spain 25 for a while now. All the top managers in Europe
would have a fairly extensive knowledge of players of this calibre/reputation.

and on a side note, when Arsenal got Cazorla, many Madrid fans were dissapointed that they got Modric instead which just shows how highly he is/was rated. Theres absolutely
no way that Wenger had come to hear of him just 12months ago.
 
Mumorn said:
If he didn't know about Santi Cazorla than the guy is a fudging macaron. It'd be like not knowing who Isco is right this moment. Cazorla has been highly rated for years, even before he went to Arsenal. He didn't buy him because he saw Wheelchair as Fabregas' replacement, then he got injured and he probably realised Wheelchair wasn't as much as a goal threat as Fabregas and it has been proven. I mean he was also in for Mata too the season before last but he chose the money at Chelsea remember.
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Bang on.
 
Can we at least laugh at Arsenal fans?

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