Arsenal fans have seen more than our fair share of not very well known young French players being brought to England to play in the Premier League since Arsene Wenger took over as our manager nearly 20 years ago. There have been some great success stories and some of the transfers have not gone so well.
The former Arsenal and England midfielder Ray Parlour is well aware of that and so he is not writing off the new summer signing of Manchester United out of hand. But as reported by The Express, Parlour does not think this move from Monaco to Old Trafford will turn out to be a success for Anthony Martial.
To be fair to Arsenal, we never paid the ridiculous amounts of money that Louis van Gaal has been throwing around over the last couple of years with Man United, unless it was on already established world class players like Alexis Sanchez and Mesut Ozil.
Even if Martial settles in quickly and does well for United, he will have to go some to justify them spending more on him than we did on Alexis. But Parlour is suggesting that the weight of pressure from that crazy transfer fee is not going to help the young French forward, and I agree.
He said, “Will Martial succeed? I look forward to seeing him play, but I think it’s going to be a miss, because the money they’ve spent is an unbelievable amount.
“For a 19-year-old kid, he’s not proven.
“If he proves to be like a Thierry Henry, which is what a lot of people are saying, then he could obviously be a great signing, but I think it is a massive gamble to take on a 19-year-old kid.
“With the money they’ve put out, I could be totally wrong, but I’m going to say miss on that one.”
It is not just the money and the pressure that it berings working against the lad either. There is the well documented difficulty that players have adapting to English football and then you have the problem of coping with the angry and arratic van Gaal as your boss to boot.
The Dutchman does not seem like the patient type or a coach who is going to put his arm around a struggling player. Good luck Martial and United, you are going to need it. So Gooners, is Parlour right?
36 mill ain’t that much.
Arsenal was ready to pay
50 mill for hacks Benzema or Cavani.
Last year Wenger bought a useless donkey Wellbeck for 16 mill.
and 12 mill Debuchy is marginal. Wenger should have bought
Gabriel to replace Vermaelen because the 4 month delay
cost us any chance of the Premiership.
Wenger also kept useless Podolski and useless injury wreck Diarby.
Hoepless Sanogo is still around and fellow dead wood
Arteta Flamini and Rosicky are STILL here!!!
Injury wreck Wilshere is safe for ever while Walcott and Ox
are a game away from their usual 3 months injury lay offs.
So Wenger is just as useless in the transfer market
I think you need a doctor fellow “Gooner”…if you are even one!! 🙁
Have you ever thought of making sense?
Podolski and Diaby still had running contracts. Hardly a choice if they don’t want to move. Sanogo gets paid by Ajax today. Rosicky is already an Arsenal legend and as a consequence the rules does not apply to him. As for Wenger, he did bought a world class player this window.
Ray Parlour parle the truth