Nicolas Pepe’s performance since his high-profile move to Arsenal in 2019 has led an AI system to include him among the top ten worst signings in Premier League history.
The Ivorian winger had impressed during his time at Lille in France, prompting Arsenal to secure his services for a record fee. The Gunners had high hopes that Pepe would make a significant impact and help them regain a spot in the top four of the league.
Unfortunately, Pepe’s time at Arsenal has been underwhelming, failing to live up to expectations. Arsenal is now reportedly eager for him to depart the club.
Perplexity AI, as reported by The Sun, has compiled a list of the top ten Premier League flops of all time, with Pepe included in this unfavourable ranking. He finds himself in the company of other players such as Andy Carroll during his time at Liverpool, Daniel Drinkwater at Chelsea, and Ali Dia during his brief stint at Southampton, among others.
Just Arsenal Opinion
Signing Pepe has been one of our worst use of money since the Premier League began and it is sad that he has still not improved.
It remains unclear why the executives who sanctioned the purchase did so. We just need to move him on and try to ensure we are not stuck with the winger for another season.
The club is moving in the right direction without him in its plans and adding him to it could change everything for us negatively.
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Can’t we push him to Saudi Arabia? Chelsea are absolutely nailing it with getting rid of their unwanted players for cash.
Joginho and Haverts to Arsenal.
Kovacic to City
Mount will end up at United.
And all the others to Saudi Arabia.
Lols
So In 30 years of the prem Pepe is in the top 10 worst signings ,give it a break ,what depths did Martin have to go to get this article up and running to carry on his crusade against poor Pepe ,oh yea the Sun newspaper,who I’m surprised is still in print .
Andy Carroll ?
😂
Played 3 years in the prem and as better numbers than Havertz who Martin called one of the best players in Europe but Pepe is a massive flop ,funny as.
Let me guess ,Viera will come on this season and will be one of the best players in the world by seasons end .
Every time Pepe is mentioned you bring up Vieira.
Give Fabio Vieira the same amount of time / seasons as Pepe.
It seems you are always the willing to give some player enough time but others not the same time period.
I will give 3 notable examples:
The Shirt Selling Genius,
AMN,
Pepe etc..
Even with the many seasons and chances they were afforded at Arsenal but still underwhelmed you continued / continue to call for them to be given even more time and chances.
But Fabio Vieira after just a season you already called him a failure and want him gotten rid of as soon as possible.
And if i can remember correctly, even with Odegaard you were not for him being signed permanently after his half loan spell here. You weren’t sold on him so was not willing to give him another chance.
Can you see why I think you have a bit of a biased blind spot?
Dont you think, Goonster, that many of us have got way past our tether in accepting plainly sub Arsenal standard players to remain so TEDIOUSLY and DAMAGINGLY long at our club, picking up huge wages while not doing the business. I OFTEN AGREE WITH YOU AND RESPECT YOUR VIEWS .
But, like very many others, I want all the obvious sub standard players gone from Arsenal altogether , not just loaned out either, but GONE. And ASAP too.
As for Viera, is it not plain that a mid teenage boys body is NOT adequate to play in our fast, tough and physicall PREM!
You need some POWER and talent alone is never near enough. He plays like a boy in a mans team and all realists can see it, whenever he plays
Dan kit, unfortunately some people don’t let facts get in the way of a good story. “Numbers” don’t matter if they do not support your argument.
@ozziegunner
No one is denying the Facts that Pepe has those Stats. The only problem is that there is surely more to a player than just pointing to one or two isolated stats. I can just pick out a stat for any player. Again, any given Stat out of context can be very misleading as clearly shown here.
If isolated numbers matters as much as you think they should then we would be getting numerous offers for Pepe and wouldn’t we be trying to tie him down.
People get so hang up on Stats even if time and time again it’s shown that these isolated stats mean nothing in a larger picture.
Some players don’t have that many stats that surely show their contributions but once you watch them play then you know. Just saying.
Look at Mustafi, stats continuely showed that he was our best CB and one of the Top CBs in the league, but we the fans knew it was bullcrap because we watched him week in week out.
Look at Nketia, he has some great numbers but that has not convinced a lot of arsenal fans about him. Why? Because they watch him daily and do think he is limited etc..
Once again, out of context Stats are like YouTube heavily edited Clips of any player. Each and every player can be made to look amazing on YouTube. Just cut and edit the best bits of that individual throughout the years and trust me, you could be willing to pay £40 million if Nketiah’s Clips were presented to you from his Youth days to today.
Look at Havertz, poor Stats but Chelsea still rated him at £60 million and Arteta thought the same, may be they are all looking at just goal scoring or assists stats here? Declan Rice, poor goals, assist stats but West Ham are not willing to accept anything below £100 million while Arsenal are willing to pay close to £100 milliom for him etc..
That’s all I am trying to say..
Goonster an excellent debunking of the stupid WAY OVER RELIANCE ON STATS ALONE, that lesser thinkers constantly indulge in.
One prime example of the misleading nonsense that stats can give us was Mertesacker. He was consistently among the very highest passing accuracy stats in the whole PREM .
What those stats NEVER told us was how MANY times a 5 or10 yard back and forth pass to Koscielny, well inside our own half, while neither had any intention of progessing the ball, took place.
I could have grown a beard in less time than it took Merts to get the ball forward to our more creative players.
Merts was altogether the single MOST SLOW PACED player I have ever seen at Arsenal and I GO BACK TO 1958
Have to agree with you Dan. There are far more better flops Pepe signed by some genius.
Chamak
Gervinho
Arshavin
Asano
Park
Sonogo
Xhaka (until Mikel transformed him)
Mustafi
Djouru
Andre Santos
Sylvestre
Holding
Chambers
Petr Chech
Ospina
Mkitaryan
Francis Jeffers
Perez
Squalichi
Igor Stepanov
LC you have left out the majority of the long list of dud CB’ signed so uselessly by ” we both know who”.
But it does not hide the fact – as we are sensibly concerned with NOW, and not the distant past – that Pepe has not the character, dynamism or ferocious will to succeed that the PREM and our club demands from ALL PLAYERS.
Disappointed to say the least that we are still banging on about Pepe. It hasn’t worked out well for him, but it all seems a bit cruel to keep mentioning it
Cruel Sue? Why certainly!
But top level football and its demands from all involved, managers coaches, fans and other players, IS CRUEL. Sheer worldwide passion ensures that is true.
In an ideal would we would all be nicer to each other, including fans to players.
But that is for a future age which our common human race MIGHT one day, far into the future , finally evolve into.
For the present, we can do our own bit in our own private lives, but we cannot change the undounted fact that TOP LEVEL football IS CRUEL. And will remain so, assuming one is a realist.
What a load of nonsense. Take his total minutes played he averaged a goal or assist every 172 minutes, that’s 1 every 1.9 games which is actually bloody good.
He was just starting to come good under emery (and early Arteta) getting double figure PL goals in his second season. Arteta just didn’t like his attitude and he doesn’t fit the Arteta ball mantra.
Considering the “large fee” was spread across 5/6 years it wasn’t that bad , not even top flop of that window let alone top 10 ever
Let’s be honest here, If Pepe had had signed for Spurs, United, City, Liverpool, Chelsea etc for £70 million and turned out like he has for us you would be labelling him a flop. I might be wrong but i do think you and most of us would be making fun of him if he was at another club.
Lukaku, Shevchenko, Torres, Maguire, Pogba, Antony etc all could look good if you looked at some of their random stats in isolation. But I don’t think you would buy then coming from a United or Chelsea fan.
Same as Haverts. Most of us do think that he flopped at Chelsea. But a chelsea fan can bring up random out of context stats to try to prop him up as not have flopped. He scored in the CL final and won it for Chelsea, this and that Stat shows he was not a flop etc. But in all honesty the majority of football fans will acknowledge that he flopped at Chelsea.
And Arteta is taking a massive gamble on Haverts right now with the ridiculous fee he has paid chelsea for him.
Comparing Pepe with non Arsenal players, though of academic interest to some does not help Arsenal one bit. Yes it makes an article, so if you like academic debates then go ahead. But for me as a realist and an Arsenal supporter only, I care nothing at all for other clubs players, unless they may hold some future value to us And being flops, they dont.
For me, suffice to say that I can think only of OZIL who damaged us massively with his idle character and obscenely awarded wages – more fool the club , rather than him for that- who comes close to being such a flop.
And OZIL DID AT LEAST HAVE TALENT, AND IN SPADES, BUT WAS SIMPLY TOO LACKING IN CHARACTER TO MAKE THE MOST OF IT. Ozil also sold shirts which helped to set off the huge waste of his fee and wages.
But has anyone seen any fans wearing a PEPE SHIRT? OUTSIDE of an asylum I mean. WHAT A TOTAL WASTE OF MONEY.
YOU WILL GET YOUR COMEUPPANCE ONE DAY SANLLEHI !!.
JF, I’m feeling an undertones or you don’t like Raul?
Just second guessing though before you start hunting me down😉
Nickerless lad, it hardly needs a detective to know that I DO NOT accept financial fraud as an excuse for completing transfers. Perhaps , as I dont know, but perhaps you are blissfully unaware of how SANLLEHI GAINED PERSONAlLMONEY AND LOTS OF IT TOO, IN THIS DEAL.
My hope is that SANLLEHI MIGHT TAKE ME TO COURT FOR LIBEL.
Well bring it on then, you thieving fraud!
Though he wont, as he knows he has stolen from our club. I do not believe in letting theft go by unwritten about.
What absolute flannel.
NUFF SAID.!
“It remains unclear why the executives who sanctioned the purchase did so.”
To people to whom “it remains unclear”, contact me because I have a harbour bridge to sell you.
One would only have to follow the money to find the million reasons why. Like jon fox the removal of an executive, who contributed a net SFA to Arsenal, seems too little of a punishment for the crime of overpaying for Pepe. This is particularly so when I compare the treatment of Sanheili, with the castigation of the great George Graham, who contributed so much as a player, coach and manager to the Arsenal. It was never proved that Graham cost Arsenal more than small change in his transfer dealings, compared to the Nicholas Pepe transfer.
I don’t think there is much between what George Graham or Raul Sanhelli did even though it’s undeniable that GG was a fantastic manager and an Arsenal man. He was taking a bung. Could have taken lots of bungs. I’m sure it was commonplace back then but he got caught. RS appears to have been more concerned with lining his pockets rather than getting the right player for Emery at the expense of the club and ultimately the team.
I think it’s totally unfair to disrespect footballers by referring to them as flops as many, including Pepe, are the victims of incompetent Management who seen to escape the wrath of fans.To me, Pepe has tried hard to make a success of his career with Arsenal.He is technically talented and improved in terms of effort , but at the end of the day, he was not up to the standard needed to be a success in the EPL.The fact that our Club paid 72m for his services merely highlights the huge error of judgement made by our Management.I wish him luck when he finally leaves Arsenal.
But ir WASNT our management , was it GRANDAD!
It was – as we all know and that certainly includes you – Sanllehi himself who drove through this transfer. You know , as we all do, that our then mamager Emery , did NOT want Pepe at all, but instead wanted Zaha, then still at his considerable peak.
So let us all who KNOW the culprit, have he guts and gumption to tell the WHOLE truth. LETS NOT FALSELY PRETEND IT WAS THE MANAGER.
Pepe was always sleeping on the pitch…a single day it happened that…He showed Liverpool central defender what footwork was…the reat of his career at Arsenal was a disaster.