Chelsea’s former striker Demba Ba has revealed he is still annoyed at having not been allowed to join Arsenal in January 2013. The 30 year-old is plying his trade in China now, and has been doing rather well since leaving the Blues.
Ba scored 18 goals in 29 Super Lig appearances for Besiktas in his one and only term in Turkey, before the club cashed-in and sold him on to Shanghai Shenua.
He has since bagged seven in his 11 league outings for his new club, but despite doing well at present, is still thinking about what could have been.
The Senegalese international is still frustrated at having had his move to Arsenal blocked at the last minute, following positive talks with the North-London side.
‘I think back to the day when Jose Mourinho blocked my Chelsea loan to Arsenal,’ Ba told France Football.
‘It was the time of his return to the club, and I think it would have been a very good move. It happened on the last day of the transfer window.
‘I was in Paris, at rest, and Arsenal representatives called me to tell me it was going to happen.
‘I then came back to London for the medical. Upon arriving, I was left surprised that Mr Mourinho had blocked my move to Arsenal.
‘Mesut Ozil arrived, and to strengthen a competitor like Arsenal was very complicated if it worked.’
Ba is another player who joined a top club in hope of dislodging the favoured stars, and unfortunately failed, but clearly still retains a decent level of ability.
His arrival would likely have made little difference to our season thinking back however, having finished 16 points behind runaway leaders Manchester United, but he clearly had hopes of joining on a permanent basis.
If we had Ba this season however, he may have given us enough options to mount a decent title challenge… Do you feel like we missed out on Ba, or just that Ba missed out on us?
Um proLific?….. L()L
He was onLy a makeshift at the time….more like a Last minute resort (after buying oziL)
before mr moanino severed the attempted move…
Not so proLific for shanghai shenhua now……. Is he?
Jeez soo pa did you not even read the stats in the article?
He would have been a great asset to Arsenal, he is a mixture of pace and power which is still China
I really wanted him at Arsenal then.prolific or not he would have been good for us..and in my opinion he is better than Giroud..
Was just asking myself, Ba was only 7m from Newcastle, why didn’t Wenger sign him then before chelsea did?
Even at Chelsea,why didn’t he sign him before deadline and before he signed Ozil???
Cos Jose blocked cos we signed Ozil and he got scared!
Wenger will never change! He still does the same till now!
Yes, of course.
the reason wenger didn,t buy demba ba was because they were not sure about an old injury to his knee looking back this was a mistake and his knee is still fine!!