It has now been months since the Arsenal midfielder Mesut Ozil had his picture taken along with the President Erdogan from Turkey, along with two other footballers of Turkish descent (hmm we haven’t heard to much about them have we?), and ever since then Ozil has been attacked from all sides in Germany and even blamed for single-handedly losing them the World Cup.
Now the sensible Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp, has made it clear what he thinks of the ridiculous witch-hunt against Ozil. ‘This is a classic example of absolute misinformation and, of course, complete nonsense,’ Klopp said.
‘In politics, little things have always been blown up and big things pushed away in order to continue. Normally, intelligent people tend to hold back because it is not easy to say the right thing. I would count myself [among those people] too. All those who have no idea are very loud in these conversations.
‘I know Ilkay Gundogan very well, I know Emre Can and Nuri Sahin very well. I do not know Mesut so well, but I would like to take him home. I do not doubt these guys, at least about their loyalty to our homeland. The difference is that they just have one more thing [in their heritage]. Where is the problem? That’s beautiful.’
Klopp went on to remember the happy days when immigrants were hailed as an important part of Germany’s rich history. ‘Cultural diversity, we all thought it was really cool around the 2006 World Cup. I saw these fantastic commercials where the parents of Gerald Asamoah and Mario Gomez had a barbecue party together,’ Klopp said.
‘We all sighed for how great that works. And now two guys are seduced by politically quite intelligent people to have a photo, and then have relatively few opportunities to say what they want 100 per cent right.
‘That’s why I find this discussion hypocritical. Bad things happened because people were not informed properly. Even the media should not create a buzz around something like this every day. Just cool off and see the people behind it.’
It is good to see some sensible comment on the situation, and to illustrate the point I have put pictures of a few other ‘celebrities’ that have been happy for a photo opportunity alongside Erdogan, but I don’t hear them being hated on like Erdogan (well maybe Platini lol).
So I’m going along with Klopp on this one. It’s all NONSENSE!
Admin
Who really cares I’m sick of hearing about Ramsey and ozil both should be benched. Raise one good argument for either and I will shut up ? Oh and include Xhaka as well the worst midfielder I’ve seen at the club in 30 years who plays regularly
I don’t think all of them would be benched at the West Ham game
I predict at least two of them would start again
I read that for the Germans, Erdogan is a symbol of oppression to people that oppose him, a shackle for the freedom of expression and a promoter of anti-secularism. His autocratic actions were criticized when he shut down many media in Turkey and imprisoned many journalists
Hence when the German’s national hero, Ozil, stated his support for a foreign figure that is viewed as a dictator by the Germans, they blasted him. I bet they did not attack Gundogan more than Ozil because Ozil is a much more popular celebrity than Gundogan in Germany
Ozil and the other Germans are free to express their opinions in public in Germany. I think Ozil knew the possible impacts of his actions as a public figure
I believe he would still do it despite knowing the consequences, because he supports Erdogan. And if that was the case, Ozil is wrong for playing victim
In an attempt to defuse the heavy politics of this post, Germans really have no such chip on their shoulder, but rather a tendency to be politically puritanical.
I’m living in Turkey at the moment and many are sad about the anti-democratic slide (as are much of Europe), I really don’t think Ozil has any interest or opinion on the political scene whatsoever. I’m sure he loves the sound of the call to prayer ringing through the streets, the familiar taste of his Mum’s menemen and having a Turkish coffee listening to people complain about Galatasaray in Turkish murmers, he’s been so disconnected with the wider landscape that the political changes have had little impact on him.
Simply, he was offered a photo with the leader of his country, felt it would be an honour, naively unaware of the irrational reactions it would evoke, and hey presto! Storm in a teacup.
No more political posts you said Mr. Admin. AND THEN YOU CHOOSE A THREAD THAT IS ALL ABOUT POLITICS. Care to tell me what the definition of a hypocrite is please?
I’ll tell you that definition if you tell me the definition of a ‘pedantic continually annoying critic’ is????
wooooooooohoooooooooooooo, the fox has been cornered !!!. advantage mr. admin , nice shout there sir.
Mr Admin, No need to get nastily personal. I only posted my comment since YOU have specifically warned us MORE THAN ONCE against political posts, with which I concur. But then YOU choose a political post . When I point out the truth you get nasty. Not an enlightened response was it Pat? So where does that leave us NOW then? Political articles presumably OK, if written by you but not discussion posts from us! Bit of a quandry I would say! Muddled thinking !
On the contrary, this strikes me as a post against the politicising of football and thus seems consistent with an anti-politics line of publication.
In short: people think this was about politics, but it wasn’t, so let’s all just move on.
The story is about educating us that politics has now shifted so far that we have no memory of what football represents: a beautiful game, played by all.
Then, we got a French lesson. Again. Look that team!
Koscielny is back in training.
Happy times ahead of us.
Ozil should show Germany what they are missing by breaking all assists record this season. How I wish he rediscovers the magic he had during his RM days. Because let’s face it, Germany won’t miss him if he continues the way he has been playing. And as it stands, he has not hit the ground running this season to a point he was even subbed off in the last game. But on his good day, we know what he is capable of so let’s hope Unai can help him improve.
Depends on whether he can get the ball in a good area to create those chances…
I highly doubt it. Emery’s running is going undermine creativity. Ozil will likely have less assist, both as he will be unfocused on attacking and final passes, and so too with the other forwards.
But, hey it is Wenger’s fault!
ozil deserves any abuse he gets , he is a grown up man, and which of us here would not take abuse for the enormous salary he recieves.he is being mollycoddled in every aspect. he needs to be dropped in to the reserves until the january window. what a sissy.furthermore, i dont give a damn what the german public think of him, none of our business, we dont pay him to play for germany, they do .
It seems to me that most probably Ozil is suffering clinical depression. Though, as a decent person I sympathise , the other losers from his total loss of interest and form are our club, which means us all. Thanks to WENGER’S STUPIDITY AND IRRESPONSIBILITY IN AWARDING HIM THIS UNEARNED AND UNDESERVED CRAZY CONTRACT, WE ARE STUCK WITH A HUIGE WAGE BILL FOR SOMETIME TO COME. No other club would dream of paying this player so mauch for so little in return. He has become , in effect a liability. AND SOME THINK WENGER has left our club. Well his body has but his malign influence still hangs around and stinks to high Heaven.
I am not interested in the political side of this debate. Where I would take issue is over the comments in particular by Uli Hoeness, the president of Bayern Munich, calling him a s**t player and not fit to wear the German shirt. That’s rich coming from an ex-con who was jailed for an 18 million Euro tax fraud. His International career as a striker wasn’t that good either scoring 5 goals in 35 Internationals. But I suppose bigmouths will always be bigmouths.
I think this whole business has had an effect on Ozil and I only hope Emery can get him to start performing again. He is on a long term contract so it is in the interests of both the club and supporters to get behind him because on his day he is a class player.
Andrew E, you have hit the nail on the head re the response to Ozil’s politically naive actions.
jon fox may be right regarding Ozil’s clinical depression, but he is being paid a lot of money to be a “professional” footballer at the Arsenal. The future is in his own hands; Ozil needs to man up and prove the doubters wrong, otherwise his career is going to take a downward spiral.
Ozil is the biggest excuse that has ever happened to Arsenal. The guy is the most overrated and overhyped player i have ever come across in my decades of being a gooner.
He has such a loyal and vocal twitter following, he and his twitter sheep / disciples live in this little bubble where Ozil like some cult hero of theirs. They absolutely worship Ozil and all this has gotten to his head. They never see any wrong in whatever Ozil does, it is always someone else’s fault but never Ozil.
So now he has this Ego and pride, he never knows when he is in the wrong because his fanbase always go on the attack against anyone that criticises him. He is always the VICTIM according to himself and his twitter sheep. Lol