Granit Xhaka says he’s been impressed with new signing Marquinhos and predicts the 19-year-old has a ‘big future’.
When the Gunners signed the Brazilian from Sao Paulo earlier in the summer, Edu was quick to stress his compatriot was ‘a player for the future’, however, he’s since been integrated into the first team rather than the under-23s and seems set to be an off-the-bench option from the get-go.
To further excite supporters, Xhaka sees similarities between Marquinhos and another Brazilian.
In an interview with the official matchday programme ahead of the weekend’s 6-0 drubbing of Sevilla, the Swiss explained:
“He reminds me of Gabi Martinelli when he first came, everyone was saying ‘yeah he will go to the under-23s first’ and stuff like this, but how Gabi adapted at this level was unbelievable, and I have the same feeling with Marquinhos as well.
“For his age he is very developed physically, very fast, good left foot. Of course, he needs to adapt to this level first, this country as well, but I see a big future for this guy.”
If Marquinhos has a big future, for fellow new boy Gabriel Jesus it’s all about making an impact in the present. After a few weeks training with the striker, Xhaka is already a convert.
“It’s very exciting,” he said. “First of all I love his attitude, his hunger to achieve something, to win something.
“He’s come from a team who have already won everything, and he gives us the hunger, the belief and the quality. But as well he’s a very humble guy. Very open, you can be serious with him, you can joke with him. This is what we need at this football club.
He added: “He’s a very high-quality player, very quick, very sharp. He’s not scared to go in for a 50-50 ball. With him and Eddie now up front we have two guys who can be very dangerous for the opponent. He’s scored already in the friendlies, hopefully he can keep doing that.”
Im kinda excited for Europa league to see the likes of Marquinos and Viera get good game time. Last season’s 1 game a week was torture.
It was torture, and you couldn’t fit everyone into this.
I couldn’t agree more. It pained me not seeing them mid week so much that I watched none of the Europa League and none of the Champions League all of last season. It’s worth bearing in mind that last season we likely never had a deep enough squad for the additional game days. What a transformation this summer
I’m actually not that disappointed on not getting champion’s league. It serves as a perfect stepping stone to bed in our youngsters into next years champion league. Plus we have a genuine chance at winning the whole thing. A big European trophy in the bank will catapult us and cement a winning chanllenging mentality. COYG
I know what you mean and given the development in the team it feels almost fated that these guys can gel this year without the additional media glare of the ECL.
The Spuds are currently giving it the big one with their ‘Thursday Night’ jibes, but the biggest laugh could still yet be on them.
I disagree, surrendering to them for top 4 definitely put the joke on us. It is just a fact. Fortunately, we have everything in place to fight back this season.
Oh do fuck off. Do yourself a favour and look at the bigger picture. Or does our history mean nothing to you simply because you were too young to remember the Invincibles? We are still head and shoulders above Tottenham; always have been, always will be. So they finished above us last season big fucking deal. They’ve won fuck all for years. I can’t be bothered to go into what we’ve done and the last time they won the big pots. Perhaps that’s something you need to do. Let’s put it this way: I wouldn’t go putting those views of… Read more »
The roar of the old school lion! Fair play to you, Q.
The guy effectively said that finishing 4th place in the league is better than qualifying 5th place in the league – possibly the most objectively quantifiable opinion in football – and your response was to tell him to fuck off. Amazing.
No. The guy did not ‘effectively’ tell me that.
The guy said that the joke is on us for finishing below Spurs. Is it bollocks.
That’s why I told him to fuck off.
Theorise and twist words all you want, but don’t bother me with crap that even dares to hint that Spurs are better than Arsenal.
Hear bloody hear!
There’s a difference between what he ‘effectively said’ and what he actually did say. So it wasn’t as ‘objectively quantifiable’ an opinion as you’d wish. Will you be celebrating our win against Palace on Friday night? Or will you still be going on about this ‘objectively quantifiable opinion’? Arsenal are a bigger club than Spurs, regardless of where they finished last May. End of.
The joke is on Spurs for even thinking that finishing above us last season wipes out our history, their distinct lack of it and somehow elevates them to a status of superiority. As an Arsenal fan, you should be laughing at Spurs, not blowing smoke up their arses. I suggest, if you haven’t already, that you check out the history books (the last 60 years should suffice) and see what’s happened in both camps. Here’s a nice little ‘fact’ to start you off. We won more League Titles at White Hart Lane than they did.
Another – ‘objectively quantifuckable’ view is this:
Spuds did sweet FA to get 4th… it was ours to lose and we did.
That’s gutting but there’s no credit to Spuds in us – having been BOTTOM after 3 games – conspiring to chuck the gimme 3 ptrs at Saints, Brighton, et al.
And – in the dark rear-ends of the turd-laden hearts, they know this!
I dont think it’s a joke on us. Spu*s definitely needed to make the UCL more than us last season. Going to a new stadium and paying all that debt, they need to make UCL every year. Our target was to make it into Europe. So Spu*s pushed the boat out and first got Conte then spent heavily in the January window. While we did not spend a single penny. Spu*s would have to be extremely lucky over 10 years to make it into Eurpo to finance that billion dollar stadium specially with new competition from New Castle. We were… Read more »
The spuds done a good deal on their stadium repayments. The deal arsenal (Arsene) done on ours was one the worst in the history of real estate. It hamstrung us for 15 years. Don’t be believing the guff that was put out at the time, we only got the loans if Arsene was guaranteed to be manager, we had the sell the naming rights, and the kit sponsorship long term and cheap to guarantee the loans. Load of shite mate. Arsene, good football coach, shit business man.
And you really think Arsene Wenger made that decision and that whole business plan on his own? This is the problem that we’ve had since David Dein was forced out- everyone at the club happy to hide behind one man who had to stand up for every decision the club took.
A lot of people also forget what a massive business loss the club suffered when Danny Fiszman sadly passed away in 2011. His vision, business acumen and expertise in the diamonds market were invaluable to the club. Dein had already been blackballed by the board in 2007, so when Fiszman died, Arsene was effectively left holding the baby, with an internal Cold War raging for ownership and other clubs being bankrolled by oil magnets. Yet he STILL kept us in the top four with third rate crap like Eboue, Silvestre, Denilson, Gallas, Santos, Gervinho and Sanogo. The guy was a… Read more »
You forgot Park….
How Wengeresque of me! 😂
Well documented Arsene pushed for the new stadium, claiming the increase in match day revenues would have us competing financially. He bet the wrong horse then beat it to death for years. He was involved at the highest level throughout the construction, he must have done 100 interviews claiming credit for it.
Mate, a lot of those Wenger quotes were made prior to Abramovich buying up Chelsea and permanently ruining the transfer market forevermore.
Thanks to that Russian cunt, obscene amounts of money being floated around – for mediocre never mind world class players – became the norm, not the exception.
Before you start laying into Wenger about our inability to compete financially, try to engage with the real reasons why first.
Come on mate.
He sold a wantaway pain in the arse (Anelka) for a veritable fortune; enough to finance a brand new state of the art training centre (which it was then).
We were hamstrung with financing the stadium, repaying the debts to the banks and trying to sell luxury flats during a recession (2008).
A recession that wasn’t Wenger’s fault.
As a guy with an economics degree and fluent on five languages, I’d trust him in the money markets more than 99.9% other football coaches, many of whom struggle with their native tongue, never mind another country’s.
Troodat Q – and let’s not forget the El Dorados he pulled on Overmars, Petit, Hleb, and others..
Football wise hard to knock Arsene, the stadium deal was poorly financed though from beginning to end. It was all in place long before the recession. The recession didn’t affect the tv payments or the attendance at games at all.
But it affected the sale of the Highbury Stadium flats. We were relying on those to go like hot cakes – they did anything but – and so our loan repayments dragged on way longer than they should have done.
That said, the board didn’t help matters with all their in-fighting over shares. And as for Ivan Gazidis. Chocolate teapot doesn’t even begin to describe that idiot.
I was never against Arsene, never once posted here that he should go. There’s a lot of revisionism on here about him. I thought he should have been allowed to stay until he was ready to walk away. But it doesn’t take away from the fact that for years the crying poverty from him and the board was pathetic, the poor deal they made on the sponsorships and the refinancing were the reason for our decline. We’re one of the big teams in the world, with a massive fan base home and abroad. The narrative that was pushed on us… Read more »
There was a world recession in the early days of our move to the Emirates in the fall of 2008. From peak to trough, US gross domestic product fell by 4.3%, making it the deepest world recession since World War II. If you think that didn’t have an affect on our efforts to repay the stadium loan debt or sell the Highbury flats, then you are living in a dream world. Which, judging by the way you’re brown-nosing the Spuds, seems already to be the case.
Different market conditions then. What a knob!
Who the fuck is downvoting this? Spud infestation.
Thurs nights will be infinitely better than ‘no nights’ when they get bounced out after group stages.
Mate, I cannot wait.
It’s going to be fucking hilarious.
That is spot on, I was happy too and now I can see it is blessing in disguise for upcoming players because we can go deep in EL while I believe with CL, we had to throw first teamers yet would have fallen short at last 16. Financially EL may not look best but in my view larger reward await if we work EL intelligently and improve player (asset) quality first.
I think it would have been more sustainable for the teams development to learn and make mistakes in champions League rather than go far into the Europa League, this is just my opinion however and I’m open to a discussion.to explain my reasons for this.
4 CL matches can never match 8-10 in a deep EL run mate? Plus the chance of winning the thing? What would that do for these youngsters experience and confidence!
How did the Europa work out for Arsene, or unai. How did we do against olympiacos and Sevilla under mikel. Hope I’m wrong but not qualifying for the champions league was a big deal. It could become an even bigger deal looking back.
You keep looking back. The rest of us will look FORWARD.
Ermm… that’s the Sevilla we just spanked SIX past?
It was a preseason game mate, let’s see how we get on in the games that matter.
I respectfully disagree, I think it would have been important for this group to have had CL this year to develop a taste for it so that the following season would be easier and more familiar. It’s a completely different challenge to Europa League, I just wanted the likes of Saka, ESR and Martinelli to learn this season and make mistakes. Of course, it is what it is now but I can’t pretend to dress the failure as a blessing imho.
Totally, stating “I’m not that disappointed…” is just trying to be optimistic. If we were in the champions league in place of s***s we’d be fucking laughing in their faces and then rubbing them in shit…
Last year we said the same thing when we missed EL. Every result will be a blessing in disguise until we get the results we actually want.
Let’s get it fucking done lads. No more fucking about. Getting beaten by s***s is just fucking embarrassing. Too many years without St. Totteringhams’s day is making the world even harder to stomach…
Mate, building an entire new squad up to ECL level doesn’t happen overnight.
Fuck the Spuds and their Wednesday nights – that is ALL those sad little cretins have got – until they get knocked out in the group stages. Then 30+ Son and Kane will start getting salty again. Big club my fucking arse.
What we are building here is far far better and takes time.
Your posts are usually very intelligent; don’t go joining the FIFA 22 brigade who want push-button success.
It doesn’t work that way.
Yeah, I like what we’re building, but this is a no more excuses season. This is the season we need to be back in the CL by the end of the year. It’s Mikel’s team now… Time to show they have what it takes…
Agreed – I would respectfully submit that the single biggest challenge facing Arse management over the next 3-5 years is to keep this group of players together. The spirit, fight, youthful fearlessness and – yes – pure ball-playing ability of this growing squad should NOT be underestimated. Keep this core together… add in a few pearlers (who will come once they see the rise and rise of the new Arse)… and we could have a new Invincibles in 5 years time. You’re supporting a club (the ONLY club) that has a century plus in the top division of English football…… Read more »
Spot on.
If we want to keep Saka, ESR, Martinelli, Odegaard and Saliba, then we need top four minimum this season.
And I for one think we will.
My top six prediction.
Interesting view. I guess there two sides to everything. EL can allow some to get up to speed (Lokonga, Marquinhos, Viera) and one more year to get the deadwoods out. As you said CL would have allowed us to build practice and hunger as well as extend key contracts. We were so close to the CL too. But what was clear for me during that last sprint for CL was the lack of trust from Arteta in some individuals. It took a while and lengths for him to finally use Elneny for example or Nketiah. Arteta seem reluctant to try… Read more »
Bollocks – our main players all gain top-flight experience playing for their countries. I’d rather learn from 8-10 EL games than getting knocked out after 3 or 4 CLs!
You’re out of your mind mate, we might well be looking back at last season as a sliding point moment in years to come. It’s not going to get any easier to qualify for the champions league, we’ve had how many years in the Europa? It didn’t end with qualification form that champions league, it ended with no European football. Last season it was 6 teams competing for 4 places. This season it’s 7. With the potential for streaming and the sky deal not being renewed by next season it could be 9 or 10 teams competing in 4 places.… Read more »
I’ve made my peace with last season. In the end we didn’t have enough to pull us through. We’ve just signed two notable players from the Premier League champions and they look electric. Last season we had two failing strikers, the better of which left in January, and have just replaced them with someone who’s coming into his prime and looks head and shoulders above them in quality. Laca was a great pro but his legs are gone, Auba evidently downed tools and didn’t have a professional attitude. I think we’re much better positioned to make top four this season.… Read more »
Top post, well said.
👍🍺
Yeah. And when we beat Palace on Friday night, you’ll have forgotten all about last May.
The only ‘sliding point’ (WTF!) moment last season was being bottom after 3 games. That’s where it could all have gone horribly wrong. It didn’t. Watch Edu’s interview and you’ll get some inkling of the unseen poison left by Sanlehi (and Gazidis who ushered him in!), the confusion created by Unai (not entirely his fault), the vacuum of power at the top. You’ll also hear that he and Arteta had a very clear plan from day 1. A plan turned upside down by C-19 but also a plan, the workings of which we are now seeing bear fruit. Early days… Read more »
Really? So you were not unhappy at our defeats and slipping out of the top 4 last season? Or is it just another reason to justify our poor performances?
we possibly have the future front 3 for brazil in our squad
Brazil’s wide attacking options are something else. Vini Jr (22), Rodrygo (21), Anthony (22), Raphinha (25), Martinelli (21)… all for two spots only
Nice to hear this about Marquinhos. I’m reserving any judgement on him given he’s young, in a new country and can’t be expected to carry the can.
Also his take on Nketiah being someone who can be dangerous for the opponent is a good observation. Nketiah is a real opportunist. He’s often latching onto loose passes and provoking mistakes he has a good attitude and proved me wrong as I started to waiver on my opinion of him last season. With Jesus as a role model he can really learn from someone with both top class ability and attitude.
I think Marquinhos will only be around for the short term before going out on loan. I suspect we will invest heavily in another established goal scoring attacker hence the links with Gakpo, Sane etc. Once outgoing busines is completed, I believe we will push to get this additional attacker in and maybe another central midfielder. If this gets done, then Marquinhos will most likely go out on loan which can only be beneficial. If the above happens, I really think this transfer window would be an A+ in terms of planning and execution by Edu and Arteta.
Watching the US match, I was pleasantly surprised at the beef Marquinhos carries – he’s a solid unit and combine that with his pace… a potential handful.
Those eyebrows too – they’ve got more than a touch of the Peter Storeys about them….!! 😂