One of the big problems for Arsenal and the other Premier League clubs this summer in the transfer market was the fact that the rest of the world seems to see us as huge cash machines. We do have a lot of money thanks to the increasingly huge TV deals but it means that the price of players seems ever more crazy.
Even the most average players seem to be costing fortunes, so it is hard to get a grasp on who is good value or expensive but top quality. I think that our new centre back Shkodran Mustafi is one of those, especially for those who do not know much about the Germany international.
Obviously we are all hoping that the transfer fee of over £30 million that we paid to La Liga’s Valencia for Mustafi does not turn out to be a big waste of money and a detailed report by Sky Sports on what he will bring to the club is very encouraging on that front.
As well as pointing out that he is the sort of defender that plays on the front foot with aggression like our own Laurent Koscielny, it says that he has a very good tactical understanding and reading of the game. By moving from Germany to Everton at a young age he grew up fast and his spells in Italy’s Serie A and Spain have given him great experience of different types of the game and he has all this experience and talent at the relatively young age of 24.
All in all it sounds like he may be the perfect partner for Koscielny at the heart of the Arsenal defence, so should Per Mertesacker and Gabriel be worried about their own chances of first team football?
Bob.
I think Mustafi has the qualities to be a great defender.But I also think Gabriel can even be better and can be Koscielny 2.0 and he will be a key player and an Arsenal great you mark my words.People write off some players with promise too early.I also think Perez should start this Saturday and the coach should not breastfeed his favourite son to start. If Arsenal were to go by their name sake he should even be 3rd choice but we have fallen and it’s understandable. For how long will people continue to ignore the truth?
yea.. that ll be the smart decision, to start playing Perez and benching Giroud’s ass especially considering we 5points behind and a draw is as bad as a loss at this point, it’s gonna be 7points behind.
City n United might play out a draw but Chelsea are very likely to beat Swansea.
7points gap combined with the advantage of them not having any midweek games/European games to play.
we on the other hand travel to Paris on wedNesday.
You mean Gabriel>Mustafi? Even though Mustafi has not kicked a ball yet for us, i think Mustafi>Gabriel.
With the way Holding played in the last two matches, I think in 2 years time it will be Holding>Gabriel. Mind you Gabriel is good.
Mustafi is one signing I have Lil or no doubt about,Not just cos Koscielny makes any1 beside him look way better (even if u are poor like Per or Chambers) but also cos Mustafi has his own qualities and is very agile, with bags of xperience and is still young.
my only slight worry is, he doesn’t stay on his feet when tackling as much as i’ll like
Yes Good signing from Wenger. Many Pundits already believed that he is best summer signing defender , ahead of Luiz and others. Manny Chelsea fans wanted Mustafi ahead of Luiz.
I am surprized that Wenger spend so much on defender, but now I am also very happy that we have filled all the gaps. How they perform is a question that we will get the answer latter. But lets be postive. We at least have players to fill our our gaps. There are many summer window passed when we all know that there is gap in our team and which will definitely haunt us. Not the case now, so lets give our new signings few games to adapt please
Sunny
Hmmmm, mustafi + koscielny= Musielny combination, I love the sound of that.
I’m not so sure why signing a defender from a defence that conceded 48 goals in 38 games is a good thing when our defence was considered bad for conceding 36 in 38 last season. To put it in perspective that’s even worse than man city’s defence who were mauled by pundits last year. That red in the game against barca in the 7-0 loss doesn’t really give the impression of a big game mentality either.