Last month the Turkish press were so sure that David Ospina would complete a move to Fenerbahce that speculation linking the Colombian with any other clubs cowered into submission.
A deal had been agreed with Arsenal and the player would sign after the Copa America. Or so they said. Since then it’s gone deathly quiet in Istanbul. We can only assume the local hacks have been entranced by Poldi’s hashtagging.
The Ospina narrative then took a twist last night with the Daily Mail carrying a quote in which the player hinted he’s not giving up on his Emirates career.
“I have always had to fight for the title position at all of my clubs,” he says.
“You expect a big club like Arsenal to improve the squad but you must always impress the manager in training.”
The statement, which we’ve yet to verify, lands at the same time as rumours mount that Everton could launch a bid for Ospina.
Both the English and Colombian press – we’re assuming the latter are following the former’s lead – carry stories claiming Roberto Martinez wants to sign the 26-year-old to challenge veteran Tim Howard next season in a deal that would see the Gunners scoop a tidy profit on the €4 million paid to Nice last summer.
Figures bandied around go as high as £12 million…which seems a bit fanciful to us.
All we know for sure is that Ospina is on holiday until 27 July and will likely miss the start of Arsenal’s domestic campaign. The man certainly deserves his time off after a cracking second half of the season that ended with him making Lionel Messi want to die.
This sounds exactly like the comments Podolski made a couple of weeks ago. “I’m always prepared to fight for my place, because I have a good attitude and stuff, so you should totally put in a bid for me, because actually I kinda want to find a new club since it seems I’m not even going to make the bench next season.” Seriously, how many players who are perfectly happy to stay and confident in their place in the squad come out at the beginning of the transfer window to say they’re ready to fight for their place? If they… Read more »
Loan him out to Everton. Then he can’t play against us but can harm the rest of Everton’s opponents. And can come back if really needed.
Why would Everton want him on loan though?
Because Howard seems to be in freefall slightly- he’s made quite a few rather costly mistakes, and a younger, sprightlier and in-form David Ospina would be a significant upgrade, even if only for a season.
Because he’s much better than their current keepers?
Lower case T Ospina.
I like David Ospina
Barcelona use Bravo for the League games and Te Stegen for the Champions League
Can Arsenal not do a similar action.
Maybe not as we have the Pole in Goal
…oh well Everton fans will have to take up our qualified mantra of: OOOOOOSSSSSSPPPPPIIIINNNNAAAAA
I wouldn’t grudge Ospina a move to Everton. Fenerbahce sounds depressing. He deserves better, hope he is the long term replacement for Howard.
you know how Flappy had the game of his life against last season? I don’t want that with Ospina. Loan him there instead for a fee.
Who’s Flappy, Twatty?
Handski
It sounds even more depressing now that they’re signing van persie
and Mikel apparently.
I’d move if I were him. He’s obviously not going to be available at the start of the season due to he’s extended break. So whoever is in his place at the time would need to make a serious mistake to be dropped. Considering he played well last season, it will feel a bit hard in him.
Although I would understand from his perspective not wanting to look like a quitter/loser who up and ran at the sight of competition.
I will love for Ospina to stay in England
Isn’t the Dutch skunk heading to Fenerbahce? Wonder if the little boy inside is looking forward to games against Genclerbirligi.
This little boy he listened to?
https://arsenalarsenal.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/vanpersie-little-boy-inside.jpg
I’m glad he wants to fight. I hope he gets the cup games and that we loan out Szcz and Martinez. Ospina is definitely better than Szcz, and at this point needs consistent game to iron out his problems.
You gotta feel for the guy,he hardly put a foot wrong all season and now finds himself out of favour,his main downfall is his height which make him a bit flappy from crosses,comanding keepers in the air like cech give the defence more confidence but if he does leave best of luck to him.ooooooooospina
Size matters it seems! AW made that clear in his comments just after bringing in Cech. In the PL you can’t have a keeper who cannot stand their own ground. I am not saying Ospina doesn’t do a good job, but he is at a disadvantage. There was an interesting stat going round that Arsenal went from conceding almost the fewest set-piece goals in 2013-14 to conceding the most in 2014-15. If true this is something AW and his team would have been keen to rectify after making great defensive improvements over the last 2 seasons. The Cech signing could… Read more »
If size matters to Wenger that much then why did he buy him in the first place.
Quick fix at the time
Probably didn’t realise Cech would be available in 1 year.
He started the season behind Szczesny and finished as no1.
Whilst at Nice he started as back up in his first season and finished as no1.
Apparently in 2012 Nice signed a new GK, he was demoted to no2 but again finished the season as No1
This guy simply doesn’t know the meaning of the words I quit.
I think Cech’s a great signing, but have a great deal of admiration for Ospina
It’s tough for keepers… An outfield drops to the bench for one game and no one bats an eyelid… Same thing happens to a keeper then all of a sudden it’s like the end of the world.
I like him but there just isn’t enough room for 3 GKs with no clear understudy.
I think £12m is quite reasonable for a goalie of his quality. Can’t believe we got him the €4 million.
Ok i know Many people including the blogtalkin man have a love for Woy boy and hope that he stays… but here i go again -= i am an Ospina man all the way and here’s why – his half season last year was the best half season of any Arsenal goal keeper on record (for a keeper who played more than 15 times) he conceded a goal every 147 minutes (Jens Lehman was a goal every 131 mins in the invincible year.) Ospina’s save percentage was 81% The only player that was better than him STATISTICALLY was Petr Cech… Read more »
I like the “blogtalkin” man thingy – so ingenious. Blogtalkin man has been censoring my comments lately, but all is well — I shall forgive him!
Anyhow, I have never understood the fascination and cum-fests of smoker-in-the-shower-boy. He is erratic to be honest. Bar one season where he tied with Cech on the number of clean sheets, he does not inspire confidence! Only the shallowest thinkers see him improving really.
I would keep OSP
You put forward a strong case. There is no way we will go into the new season with 3 GK’s who all want game time. Wenger will have to decide soon if he hasn’t already. My gut feeling is that he will stick with Szczesny. My reasons: – his height and ability in the air are deemed vital – his bond with the club – the amount of time we invested in him – his strong personality and over-confidence is something you want in a GK – AW believes in him (this is the most important, and if true, AW… Read more »
Plus – Szczesny is homegrown, Ospina isn’t. Less of a factor for a first choice keeper but more important I think for a back-up.
He put forward a strong case? I don’t think it could be any stronger.
I remember how everyone was comparing Szczesny to De Gea when De Gea was at United and everyone said De Gea was garbage. Well since that time De Gea, has improved greatly. Szczesny quite simply hasn’t and he only has himself to blame.
It was Szczesny’s fault all day long in the league cup final… That’s like co-blaming aaron ramsay for the shawcross assault because he was in the same frame as ryan amount of time invested in something is irrelevant if you are flogging a dead horse, Has Szcz peaked? Is he on the Gus Caesar path? In horse riding terms Szcz reacts to the whip – he needs a reminder and to be frank – its the one position that you can’t be worried about your players focus and desire. Decent?? again statistically he was better than Seaman, Lehman, Almunia, Szczesny… Read more »
I’m not getting into this debate but using the ‘statistics’ thing is just wrong. Firstly keeper statistics are usually flawed, because they’re formed by many different things, mostly by the defence in front of them. Yes ‘saves per goal’ is a decent stat, but if you’re defence holds strong and only allows shots from outside the box, then your keeper has a better chance of making saves without conceding. A defence that constantly gets broken down and allows tap ins, makes it much harder for a keeper to make saves and the keeper will concede more. (Although he will also… Read more »
“And lastly, the only reason Ospina’s ‘stats’ are better than the others is cause he played for a short duration with the best performing Arsenal side in years” The pole played the 2013/2014 season in which “he” won the golden glove with the best defensive displays we’ve had in years, yet szcs gets all the credit, Ospina plays behind a stable defense too, he gets zero credit
I hear you and in the spirit of non debate 🙂 i have said in my original comment that Ospina’s “Stats” address the fact that he may not have been playing in as stable a defence as we all credit him. I.e. He made more saves per game than Szczesny so he had more saves to make per game Rant time………. i am sick of arsenal conceding 1 goal from 1 chance against smaller teams and that seems to happen far less when ospina is in goal In the big loses last year -(and before) 6-3 to city – Szczesny… Read more »
You are exactly right!! I was actually coming here to respond saying the same thing. Honestly, during the first half of the season with woj in goal it seemed like all a team needed to do was get one attempt on target and it was going in. No matter how quality or garbage the opportunity was. We would dominate games, even with our makeshift back four, but one shot meant a goal n that usually was enough to cost us points. De gea was infront of garbage all year at United and single handedly kept them from languishing somewhere mid… Read more »
I dont understand why we would then rate cech, courtious (however his name is spelled) or neuer as each of them have had quality defenses Infront of them habitually, yet their abilities aren’t ever questioned. Quality is measured by how well they deal with the situations in front of them and ospina has done extremely well. Contrast that with szczesney who was basically leading the league in mistakes directly leading to chances/ goals. That’s not the defense’s fault. Sadly, he’s always been questionable. We’ve always seen that with his head down, he’d be decent but far too often it hasn’t… Read more »
http://www.squawka.com/players/david-ospina/stats#performance-score#nice#french-ligue-1#24#season-2013/2014#58#all-matches#1-37#by-match In that link you will find Ospina’s stats from the 13/14 season in which he played behind a defense, at Nice, that is much worse than what he had this season at Arsenal. You will see that his stats are consistent. His saves per goal are even better in that season at Nice. I agree that stats can be deceiving at times, and that is why you increase your data size. I have just done that there. Compare those stats to his season at Arsenal below: http://www.squawka.com/players/david-ospina/stats#performance-score#arsenal-(current)#english-barclays-premier-league#8#season-2014/2015#126#all-matches#1-38#by-match He’s consistent. And an incredible goal keeper. The stats tell a comprehensive… Read more »
I tend to agree regarding Ospina. I think it’s strange how he’s done so well yet nobody is impressed. Maybe that’s just how it feel to have a solid, reliable GK? Maybe we’ve just forgotten that feeling having Almunia and the Polish boys in goal for so long. Also if the argument is that Szczesny has got more potential, why don’t we loan him out for one or two seasons? I say try to give the guy a change of scenery and let him learn from training and/or playing in Germany, Italy or Spain. Flamini went to AC Milan and… Read more »
And even when the pole “won” the golden glove (I still stand that golden glove or clean sheets for that matter have to do more with defense as a whole than the ability of a goalkeeper), his stats werent that impressive, at least not better than Ospina ones last season
He did concede 17 goals in three games :/
Fair points well made above (all of them) Double98
We do forget this fact : all our big loses in 2013/14 had The Pole was in goal
We blamed others in midfield but he went un-acknowledged for his lack of quality between the sticks.
Compare: When Manu was failing in midfield DeGea was saving them points.
Yes Ospina had a settled defence, in 2014/15 but so did The Pole in 2013/14 and we had done embarrassing loses. Did he not win the Golden Glove that season ( maybe my seasons are wrong)
Just a small problem with the claiming crosses stat – I don’t have the numbers with me, but it felt like Szcz made more attempts at claiming crosses than Ospina. Especially in the FA cup final I think there were a couple of times when he came out and I thought Ospina wouldn’t/couldn’t do that.. I could be wrong though
It is the totality of the stats that i think overwhelmingly favors Ospina. There is an emperors new clothes thing going on here.. Szczesny looks like a proper keeper. He has that presence, height, athleticism, ranginess like De Gea and that substantialness of neuer. That perception has seemingly clouded our judgement of him. The simple fact is that he’s not that good. He had one purple patch two seasons ago when Fabianski got a run in the side but before and after he has not delivered to the degree we need. His stats are worse than Almunia’s. – We hounded… Read more »
Come again..?
So.. right now it looks like we’ll have three top notch goalkeepers. We’ll have the best ‘keeper coverage in the world if that’s the case, by quite a margin too I’d say.
I still think one of them will leave, but I do like this whole “squad depth” thing we’ve got going on, as it’s the exact opposite of our situation just a few years ago.
I feel like it’s the exact opposite of our situation just one year ago. The additions of Gabriel, Alexis, Welbeck and Cech plus the emergence of Coquelin, Ospina, Bellerin and Monreal in the past year with really only Podolski and Sagna (unless I’m forgetting somebody?) of any note leaving the squad have just reinvented the team.
Plus the addition of Debuchy too, sadly understandable that I forgot him. But he looks top class, can’t go wrong with either him or Bellerin really.
I think at the end of day we will come back to square one even though this is supposed to be our year. Wenger will correct one mistake and cause two in return. it’s been a long time since we had a good goalkeeper in post, so I was thinking with Ospina’s quality plus Cech’s experience is going to make us a hard nut to crack so we have to quickly strengthen in the areas where we are weak and make sure we can win the league but why and how should Ospina be linked with a move away ?
Oooooasssspppppiiinnnaaaa all the way
way. More stable, better stats, less likely to smoke. And you have to give him credit for giving confidence to defence to help them.
Szch is wasting his potential and I for one would prefer opsina as a reliable backup and to challenge Cech than smokey Joe.
It’s amazing to me people still give Sczcesny the benefit of the doubt. How many soft goals, irrational challenges, mental lapses will it take? He isn’t ready. Ospina is and has showed it. Poland has even has enough of his crazy antics. If he wants to stay he’d do well to learn from professionals like Cech and Ospina and bide his time at Arsenal.
The stuff in the copa America final is proof enough Ospina deserves a chance to fight.. That double save was mighty.. Can’t have a better back up..the smoker needs to find new showers