Takuma Asano felt like a strange signing when we bought him from Sanfrecce Hiroshima in 2016.
Three years on and the striker has yet to kick a ball for the club, having spent two seasons on loan with Stuttgart and one with Hannover 96.
His last campaign in the Bundesliga did little to suggest he has any kind of future with Arsenal, making just 15 appearances in all competitions, and scoring 1 cup goal. He failed to find the target in the league all season.
As we look to clear the decks a bit this summer, the Japanese international seems like an obvious candidate for a departure, and there is reportedly interest in him from Partizan Belgrade who would like to take him on loan for a year.
However, the same report says that Arsenal have two offers to buy the player from German clubs, and that would seem a far more sensible deal to do.
He’s not going to play for Arsenal, another season on loan is pointless, and selling him would help us recoup some of the reported £3.5m we paid for him.
Can our Head of Football, Raul Sanllehi, and his minions sort out a transfer somewhere else? They don’t appear to be that busy with anything else, so let’s hope so.
Another genius signing from Wenger…
And we are about to spend £27 million on Saliba and then loan him back for a year.
What fucking brainless management….
There is nothing wrong with what Wenger or Arsenal did about this. Pay very little for a promising player; loan him out while he is ineligible to play in England, and wait a couple of years to see if he develops into a good enough player. If you don’t want to do this sort of thing, with the possibility–the likelihood, really–that a given player will not work out, then you cannot moan about our failure to spot good players before they become famous.
True, but the financial problem that Wenger and the others in charge then have saddled us with is buying players for big money and paying them well over long-term contracts when they proved not to be anywhere near as good on a consistent basis as that outlay suggests. Step forward the likes of Ozil and Mustaphi for example (but there are others still in the squad, of course). Nobody seriously believes we can offload either at anything but a massive loss to the club – nobody appears to be interested currently, which should tell us something. These two cost a… Read more »
Collecting young players with potential and selling them off if they don’t make it is a revenue stream for all major clubs.
Wise up and read more.
He had to take risk in market.
And yes Wenger in his defense spent considerably little on less proven talent.
Even Campbell for all the hash many prefer to make about Dick Law of the jungle cost a paltry sum.
I’m not so sure if we are in same territory if this Saliba deal has any truth to it.
And for all you can say about Wenger, he always had the club and the team at heart.
I’m not so sure about the current career transfer regime be it the thankfully departed Mslintat or Sanlehi’s world that has replaced him.
I think we all knew this would be a complete waste of time the day he signed & so it’s proved.
More financial mismanagement from Wenger & Gazidis, no wonder they left so quickly, they have a lot to answer for.
Sell him for whatever you can get & move on.
You have to sign a lot of players like this to find a breakout star. He was around the same price as Gabriel Martinelli, so I don’t think any “financial mismanagement” was going on. This is kind of just how you have to operate to be successful. (But also target the right prospects)
Seriously, which players from that part of the world have ever worked in the Premier League? Park at United, that’s about it. Given our history of Inamoto, Chu-Young & it Miyaichi it was pretty evident that this kid would have to have exceptional skill to get a chance in the first team & predictably he didn’t, we signed Perez for 18 million knowing he wasn’t good enough, so this was a complete waste of time & money and yes, in their later years at the club both Wenger & Gazidis have a lot to answer for, plus the owner for… Read more »
Son is a pretty good player and the guy at Leicester (think he’s just left) but in general not many players from the Far East do well in England.
£3.5m was a lot of money to pay on a hunch so Wenger must have been quite sure that he had what it takes.
Miyaichi did really well on loan in Holland, seemed at one time that he might make it, but a spell on loan at Bolton (if I recall?) finished him off…
The Dutch used to call him Ryonaldo or something like that!
‘Players from that part of the world’ don’t need to be a great success on the field to be a financial success (or at least not a big financial loss) for the club. They’re generally a better risk than South American or African players financial wise as just having him on an AFC contract will guarantee some kit sales out there (and there are much less fake kits for sale there as well). On top of this there are quite a few Japanese companies sponsoring/advertising/partnering with PL teams and that’s more likely to happen if the club has some Japanese… Read more »
Saying “Which players from that part of the world have ever worked in the PL?” is pretty ridiculous.
You can blame the signings on mismanagement of funds, cynical attempts to sell shirts or build commercial revenue, or more likely on a scouting structure which is not as strong as it is in other parts of the world. Blaming the players themselves seems a bit… ethnocentric.
Peoples success are not by mistake. And financial mismanagement wasn’t the biggest offence of Wenfers here
This was us prospecting. Every club in the world does this. And when it does not work out they handle it pretty much in the same way. Not unique to Us and it is certainly not a thing to blame Wenger and Gazidis(even though he is to blame for a lot) for.
Yes our greatest ever manager has a lot to answer for
He’s not our greatest ever manager. George Graham and Herbert Chapman won their titles from the ground up, Wenger didn’t. Unlike the other two, he inherited a brilliant squad then tanked the club.
He didn’t inherit a brilliant squad and completely transformed the club into the most exciting team in the history of the club. I have been a supporter for over 65 years and can never remember seeing Arsenal play with such flair. We won 10 trophies including 2 doubles and an undefeated league season and even at the end 3 Fa Cups in 4 years. As I said the greatest manager we ever had
Thank you for your unwavering support (over 65 years!!) and for your perspective on Wenger and all things Arsenal. Let’s hope the new regime can bring back the flair sometime soon.
He inherited a squad which was seriously aging and would have been extremely unlikely to have won anything without a serious rebuild.
He extended the playing life of many players who wouldn’t have seen any more success in the PL.
@James Bingham, you are one of our shittiest fan ever.
Yes he does. A few FA Cups saved his legacy but he’s left us in a very difficult position.
I can see your legacy on your tombstone: Here lies a whiner.
Collecting young players with potential and selling them off if they don’t make it is a revenue stream for all major clubs.
Wise up and read more.
Ain’t no worries, for the rest of his daaaaayyyyyyyysss…
Takuma asano. What a wonderful phrase!
And……..this is why i hate this system of buying “prospects”. If i remember correctly when we got asano we were in dier need of signings and especially attacking players. they sold us the dream of a diamond in the rough that will prove to be a transfer masterstroke. can we please please please stop buying these type of players, atleast until our first team is legit. Can we please just buy players that are already in the league or atleast first team in respectable leagues. can we please stop with the genius moves and just make obvious purchases like a… Read more »
Its OK to gamble on these sort of players.
BUT if we are relying on them for next season, that becomes a very different issue.
And if we are paying very high price (when we have tight budget constraints that may compromise our purchase on more essential players) and have to rent them back to club of origin, that becomes an issue.
‘They don’t appear to be busy with anything else’ – that pretty much sums it up. We are one month away from the window closing and have, thus far, the Brazilian lad aside and Ospina’s departure, achieved the square root of nothing. Even the ‘no one else is doing much’ argument fails abjectly as others clearly are. Nice to see Steve Gerrard say today that if anyone wants to sign that loopy Columbian they have, they’d better bid now and get on with it, as he won’t sell him at the end of the window – ie when no replacement… Read more »
I was ok with this gamble when we took ot, so i.m not going to get all wise and diss it in hindsight. We should be taking risks on young potential breakout stars. Even if only 1 in 10 are hits then it is still a bargain. You know, like everyone saying why didn.t we sign N’Golo Kante or Dele Alli
I liked this gamble. He cost us not alot and we received some loan fees to offset the price. You never know about those late bloomers with raw talent. Just look at where Giroud was at that age. Good luck to him in the future. A good %of next sale would offset some of the remaining loss on this gamble.
The most annoying thing for me is that we money pinch in the beginning then end up panic buying for more at the end…
“They don’t appear to be that busy with anything else” makes a very depressing read in the second week of July!
Another one to add to the Junichi Inamoto collection. I wonder how many, if any, Asano shirts we sold in Japan to offset that £3.5 million. At least Inamoto was only signed on loan.
I will miss him so so much.
He hasn’t gone yet!
Was the “Wonder kid” from before.
Martinelli, meet Asano, before him Miyaichi.
I remember people getting excited about Cohen Bramall.
They would wank of to the potential and how these players like Bramall was better than say Kolasinac.
Easy to fog one’s mind up with these fantasies because one is upset with certain players, amplify their faults without seeing their merits and instead imagining quality in players that are lesser (Like Elneny and Jenkinson).
I hardly doubt anyone ever thought that Bramall is better than Kolasinac, so calm down mate. Also: “Easy to fog one’s mind up with these fantasies because one is upset with certain players, amplify their faults without seeing their merits” Isn’t that exactly what YOU do every time you comment on Torreira? Always highlighting the fact that he made some errors that led to goals in December, yet never acknowledging the fact that he is a relatively young, new signing, in a new team, new system, , new league, under a new manager and still finding his feet in the… Read more »
I’ve always tempered my opinion on Torreira unlike many people on Mustafi. I’ve always said he was a decent buy but hardly the solution many make him out to be in midfield and certainly not one without plenty of faults as well. What’s foggy thinking is people who cast blame on certain players and then pretend issues don’t exist with others. As always mentioned, Sure Mustafi is far from a water tight player and certainly not anywhere near our first pick but even with Koscielny-Sokratis against Wolves(and then against Chelsea in finals) we leaked goals aplenty. And with Torreira we… Read more »
Just before some people wank of to Martinelli…we’ve been there before….high school kid from Japan (Miyaichi), Asano, Cohen Bramall…etc. Instead we are now rumoured to want to spend substantial money on Saliba, a young player who has yet to play regularly for St Ettiene and worse we have to loan him back. Which means still no solution at CBack. And however much they will say it has no impact on our transfer budget of 45m, it will because we won’t spent the however much over on say a winger or cback bc we already put that “small’ but significant amount… Read more »