He decided they fine for another year, its still on him to a degree. Big strikes against him: choosing Pastore over Ziyech, replacing Alisson with Olsen, and buying Defrel as a RW. Thankfully he didn’t extend Dzeko’s contract. I don’t understand why he would want Arsenal? The same situation just happened here with Sven.
Actually, Fazio appears to be a Mochi signing. His record at Roma is mixed. He has signed a lot of journeymen veterans, like Fazio, Kolorov, Gonalons, and Nzonzi, together with some a couple of very good youngsters in Under and Pelligrini. Justin Kleivert may also eventually prove to be a very good young signing.
To be fair... Fazio had just come off a 2 yr loan stint with Roma and had done well for them during that time Kolorov was super cheap and while old he was coming from playing at a pretty high level for City. Very reminiscent of our signing of Licht. Gonalons joined at his peak (26/27) after 8 yrs at Lyon. At the time he was considered one of the better DMs in France and they got him cheap. I recall people on this forum wanting Wenger to go after him before he signed with Roma. NZonzi was the most expensive of that group but he has actually been good for Roma (from what little I have seen and read)
NZonzi is fine and would be good for Arsenal. It hasn’t worked at Roma because he can’t play with DDR but he doesn’t suck like Dzeko.
True but unless the owners are gonna give you crazy money it is pretty impossible to turn over an entire roster that quickly so there are some guys you just have to except as part of the roster. Plus he may not have been able to unload some of those guys. Pastore vs Ziyech, etc... no one is gonna get every deal right
Which is why I said to a degree. Juan Jesus is an unmovable example. Big contract, older, just screwed there. Fazio and Florenzi just don’t play well enough anymore. I thought they’d be fine too. But Pastore vs Ziyech, I actually believed Pastore would be ok but almost every other Roma fan wanted Ziyech.
Easy call in hindsight, tough at the time. Ziyech has looked good but at the time he was just starting to show out and was doing it in a traditionally poor defensive league. Few offensive players make as big an impact outside of the Netherlands as they do in that league. Pastore was a proven international that was capable of playing at a very high level when he was healthy.
If not him who else? What has overmars done? Did he recruit their young talent or are they Ajax academy since day one?
I'm too lazy to go search his tenure at Ajax right now but despite Ajax academy having a very good rep, their production of really good players has been low since that mid 90s squad was blown up up until this current crop. He could very well be credited with that improvement back to the old academy form.
I'm not. Don't know enough about him good or bad. Just like I really didn't know much about Sven before he came to Arsenal.
Not only for Ajax, but for all the top academies of the Eredivisie and there's one single cause, the EPL clubs. These have been raiding the academies and lured all the top talents away. However none of them were brought to star level by the EPL acadfemies. Since the last few years most of the Dutch kids have learned that lesson and chose to stay and follow the old and proven Eredivisie track. Tada..new stars are born (and not ruined by the shit EPL academies). A Belgian university did a study of the succes of Belgian kids moving to the EPL academies and those that stayed put. Turned out that almost none of those that went to the EPL academies was a succes.Worse for the EPL was that Belgian kids moving to the Netherlands, Germany and France were equally successful as the kids that stayed in Belgium. Perfectly in line with the Dutch experience. So your observation superficially was correct, but it needed complementary addition. So it's not a credit for Overmars or whoever in Dutch academies. It's just the result of kids now staying instead of hopping the Channel. After Brexit it will be impossible for EPL clubs to get kids in, so expect after Brexit a blooming of talents into stars on the continent.
I see Monchi having similar problems here. Working with an owner who isn’t interested most of the year then pops in to make big changes...that never works. Let alone the money and aging squad issues.
Gedion Zelalem is signing with Sporting KC. He had some good showings for Arsenal in the preseason Asia tour as a 16 yo and received comparisons to Cesc. I remember USMNT fans hyping him as the American Messi when he chose the US over Germany. Too bad it didn't work out for him, would have been cool to have an American star for Arsenal.
He was never going to make it Too small and weak and injury prone for the prem I’m glad the Dutch league is keeping their players, Chelsea and city are Cnut clubs who harvest talent then bin it
When Ole took over Yanited, they had 26 points. De Gea has made 97 saves, kept 7 clean sheets, 1 error leading to a goal this season although I don't have the stats for him upto matchday 18. Fact is, without De Gea, they would be boned. Easily saved them 5 points this year but then go through the tapes and that number could be higher. That absolutely has been the key change for them, and I should have worded my post better. They'd have been further down the table when Ole took over rather than they would currently be in 9th if it wasn't for De Gea.
The transfer window is actually a player registration window. It only matters whether the destination club is in the window.