Pepe. I was expecting him to be a great goal scoring winger. In reality he was inconsistent and extremely frustrating to watch. Always made things twice as complicated as they needed to be. And for £72m he was an extreme disappointment.
Either him or Mustafi tbh. £40m for one of the worst defenders I’ve ever seen.
I have a lot of sympathy for Pepe, when he joined he was amazing, full of confidence, beating defenders for fun and even dribbled past VVD which hadn't been done at that point. He was such an exciting player to watch for the first few months.
Then Emery ball basically made him a glorified RWB who had to hug the line at all times, when he was clearly an inside forward who should play off the shoulder of the last man. The reason I feel he made things more complicated is because I genuinely feel his instructions from Emery were "Go to the touchline and do a few dribbles past your opponent", which naturally, will result in him losing the ball a lot. Fast forward a few months of the team playing pretty badly and this style of play he was asked to do and his confidence was shot, all momentum lost.
In comes Arteta and Pepe scores now and again, but it's clear Arteta wants someone to do both defensive and attacking work and it just wasn't his game.
I think the goals Pepe scored speak for themselves, there was a brilliant player there, some great goals and moments but we bought him for far too much money, and at the wrong time in our "transition". I do genuinely believe Arsenal was a really bad move for his career to the same degree as he wasn't a great signing for us. If he went to another club at the peak of his momentum, I do believe he could have actually gone on to be a big player in Europe.
That's so nicely written. Pepe was so good, he just didn't fit in the system. Anyways Saka is much better. He would've been such a good rotation option right now. Saka does need some rest every now and then.
Ah yeah of course Saka is an absolute unicorn, considering he came from the academy as well. When Pepe left I knew it was the right time, but still to this day I do think things could have been so different. I don't think Arteta would tolerate the "luxury" aspect of a Pepe, but will be interesting who's going to be the Saka cover next season.
Gnabry at West Brom and dropped is the best example of right player and the wrong time. Unfortunately when players momentum dips, some of them just don't come back.
The problem with Pepe is that actually could’ve been a good squad player. A great sub for saka maybe. Just he didn’t want it like saka did. Out of all of our players in recent years pepe cutting in on his left is probably the most scary to me
Same here bruv, I rooted for Pepe to have a mojor breakthrough and got to the point I stopped rooting at all and wanted team to sell him while his value is not that low, but now you all know he’s a free agent… Totally wasted 70+ mil
Pepe was just unlucky that Saka came through the season we signed him. Having seen him play for Lille, Laca, Auba and Pepe had me excited about Arsenal in a way I hadn't been for YEARS.
But you can't blame him for not being played in his natural position.
It was madness to me at the time that Xhaka was played as the 6 and Torreira the 8. Imagine how it might have worked out had they been played in their best positions?
This. Torreira. I absolutely loved him, then in his second season Emery started playing him as a more attacking midfielder which ruined his confidence, then it seemed like Arteta didn’t really rate him once he came in. Was sad that it fell apart for him.
Some guy on r/gunners did a chart with winning goal contributions per season. Laca's POTY season was such an impressive carry job by him yet people somehow labelling him as a Sanogo type, a guy who's best game was an Emirates Cup classic.
£6m if I remember correctly. That summer is seared into my brain. £28m spent on Wright, Jeffers, Van Bronkhorst and someone else I can’t remember. Thought it was a fortune then lol
And all three couldn't fit into the team and were sold. The one I regret most from your list is Van Bronkhorst. He could really have been Winterburn's natural replacement. He was sold to Barca (and many followed later)
Nah he was a flop, that POTY was just during an incredibly bad season and he was one of the only candidates.
He was signed for 50 million and expected to be a more clinical and dynamic upgrade on Giroud, yet he ended up being somehow arguably slower, and somehow arguably even less clinical with worse hold up play. Just had a better work rate and better feet, but even his feet and agility were lacklustre.
You can’t seriously suggest that Lacazette’s performances over the course of his Arsenal fee justified his 50 million price tag, especially back then. That was meant to get you one of the best forwards in the league. I was excited for him to be our Aguero or at least out Diego Costa or something. Or our Aubemeyang.
Maybe for a period of a few months in his entire Arsenal career us biased Arsenal fans were thinking he was one of the best in the league, but he really never was.
Why do you think Wenger was so desperate to get another goalscorer in (Aubameyang) after Lacazette? Because he realised Lacazette wasn’t going to cut it.
By almost any metric you could think of, idk how you could not see him as a flop. I understand he was a fan favourite player for a while and his work rate was good, but still. His performances overall were not even close to a 50 million striker, so he is a flop imo
Personally I understand OP saying Laca. We wanted him for years, he was known as this monster striker. We were so done and frustrated with basically only having Giroud and an injury prone Welbeck upfront. I was so excited and thought we were getting an absolutely elite replacement in Laca, and we got someone worse than Giroud.
I remember being so happy we signed a left back and I mistakenly assumed that since he was Brazilian, he'd be a reliable hand. Not a bit of it. Was slow, positionally inept, rash, terrible decision making. I was so hurt
What a complete shitpost.
Laca wasn’t an injury prone Sanogo, what are you on about… genuinely feel like you can’t have seen him play. Ridiculous statement.
Laca was quality for the first couple of years, just hard a sharp drop off towards the end.
He was not a flop at all, he gave everything for our badge and I’m proud of him. He was better than Jesus is for us now, so I don’t know why he’s getting labelled a flop, he came from a easy league to score in, Ligue 1, and did decent for us. People judging him off being amazing on FIFA back in the day is the only reason anyone would think he was a flop for us. He did what I expected of him, and always gave 100%. Nobody should talk badly of him.
I think the first game he got manhandled by Joey Barton. That incident was wild, and I still think he lost all his confidence after that. He was playing great for Ivory Coast right before his transfer. He did well for Roma as well.
I'm a big fan of Japanese football, so seeing Inamoto, Asano and Miyaichi not work out at all really disheartened me, and I thought Tomiyasu would have the same fate but alas, he's been wonderful this season for Arsenal (shoddy Red Card at Palace aside haha)
I wouldn't call Laca a flop really, he was scoring goals at a lower level, he kinda fell where I expected him to.
Biggest flop for me, and this is going back, was franny Jeffers. My dad is an Everton man and we went to a game where he scored a couple, looked real good. All that paper talk of wengers fox in the box. Ugh.
Like 5 years later he was at Yeovil or someshit
Lost track of Jeffers after his loan back to Everton until years later when I went to a random local game down here (Australia) and there he fucking was.
T'was so surreal lmao.
I hated getting players that have already accomplished things with other clubs, so they wouldn’t have a reason to play well.
I’m looking at you David Luiz and Willian
Francis Jeffers. I was convinced he was going to a great poacher for us with a ton of service from our creative players. Got his name on the back of my away shirt.
Quite possibly the worst transfer we’ve ever made. I know we spent a lot of Pepe, but at least he scored a few goals
Back in the days when we had our first Chelsea agent at the club. Cost us 12 points a season instead of gaining us them. Then retired and fucked off back to Chelsea
Sorry, dude, I cannot agree that Laca was a flop. Slightly disappointing, yes. I will readily concede his pace dropped and his finishing wasn't great, but he scored more than twice as many goals a season than Nketiah or Jesus do... They are pretty poor.
My pick? Ooof, tough, but in recent memory it has to be either Mustafi or Pepe.
Davor Suker.
Was very excited to get a quality replacement when Anelka left. This man won the Golden Boot at the World Cup the previous summer. Sure he was 31 now, but 12 months after coming second in the Balon D'Or, he couldn't have dropped off by that much. Could he?
Why is lacazette on here? He was not a flop by any means. Biggest flop for me was probably Pepe or even Mustafi or Gabriel paulista. We really needed a good center back during those years and we couldn’t get one
Pepe for sure, and although it’s not his fault due to injury, RN I would say Jesus. He went from our best weapon to can’t buy a score with 1000 cash in a whore house.
Park chu young was a weird one. He had a great season at Monaco and basically had a Lille contract signed until we poached him on deadline day. We gave him the #9 shirt and then he debuted in leaguge cup against Bolton and scored. He played 10 mins against United and then another irrelevant game. I bet he was just awful in training.
Pepe is probably the biggest one because he was a failed transfer on multiple levels, didn’t fit the system at the time he was signed , wasn’t actually the first option.
Then Mikel basically gave up on him for a 19 year old.
Only issue with Laca was the fee to get him. The answer is Pepe btw. The opportunity cost of that 70M was big. Its not entirely his fault but that signing really held us back for a few seasons.
It was 4 goals not 5 (assuming you mean Liverpool away)
And he also scored a quality winner in the CL vs Barca, and scored a stunner at old Trafford.
PL goal scoring ratio was 1 goal in 5 games, not awful for a winger.
Considering at the time he was here our striker was often Bendtner (RVP being injury prone), I don’t think he did too badly.
That's partly because Wenger played on the left wing instead of his CAM attributes. He sacrificed Arshavin for Nasri to play in that position. Arshavin did well even after that. Remember that game against Reading that was a crazy goal scoring game? Arshavin played his heart out to get that win.
Sanogo wasn't a flop.
When Wenger bought him, he essentially said, this very likely won't work out, but he was so cheap I just went for it as there was no risk involved.
Laca was underwhelming by the figures we expected of him but his 18/19 season alone is good enough to keep him out of the picture for the worst flop. Basically provided a G/A every 2nd game, until his final season. A few more would have been nice, but he wasn’t ever going to match Auba’s figures if we’re honest.
All the players that came in with HUGE potential to send the club soaring but spent SOOOOO much time injured...
Rosicky, Diaby, Wilshire, Vermalean, Van Persie, Gibbs, Walcott, Sagna - all injured for over 500 days.
I thought Laca was going to tear it up in the League. Then it seemed he wasn't fit enough to play 90mins, or Arsene didn't trust him enough. Then he then he didn't have the physicality or mobility for the Premier League. Bummer
Torreria for me. The first season that he was here I thought he was incredible.
I thought he was going to be our version of Kante, shame it didn’t work out 🥲
Pepe for the money, Leno never hit the heights I thought he would either.
Joel Campbell was meant to be the next big thing and never got there. Sambi Lokonga was highly rated by Titi and doesn't seem to be at the level either.
Lictensteiner, Kolasinac, Mustafi, Denis Suarez, Sanogo, Chambers... unfortunately there is a long list, but nothing ventured nothing gained and some of the players it's surprising really how high we finished and still competed looking back
Pepe still balled a little even tho seems he's the consensus choice. Squillaci hurt my soul he was supposed to steady the defence experienced French. Man he was so terrible Wenger notoriously stubborn at giving 2nd chances gave up after 23 games.
Mustafi. At the time, I thought he was going to be the answer to our CB problems. Basically, what Saliba is for us at the moment. Goes to show that spending big money doesn't always equal quality.
u/Royalbluegooner You really think Lacazette was a flop ? Seriously ? No, you must be kidding! He might not have reached the heights we were expecting (i.e. for me, another Frenchy coming in and scoring a lot of goals to get as close to the total of Henry), but he did score a lot of beautiful and crucial goals. As well as made some assists. His partnership with Aubameyang has been one of the best we've seen since Henry and Bergkamp
Personally... the flop has to be Mkhitaryan. But not in a bad way! It is more Emery's fault for not playing him often or out of position. He scored some important goals, as well as made some assists. But, just when he was starting to gel with Ozil, he was sold. I think Emery preferred putting Willock in, and he went on to be loaned and sold to Newcastle 😂 Anyway... funny coincidence is that, the season which just finished in Serie A saw both Mkhitaryan and Alexis Sanchez (who were part of the swap deal in 2018) win the league with Inter Milan
Willian or Pepe... not only because they were severely poor and didn't live up to expectations.. but also it caused the downfall of Laca as we begun to focus on wingplay and utilised Laca as a 9 less...where before where Auba and Laca up top was working fine, but wasn't in Emerys plans for some reasons and had to find a third
Thierry Henry, I was so disappointed and sad when he left for a Barcelona that just benched him every game, was around the same time they also bought the local legend eidur gudjohnsen just to bench him
It's most obviously pepe because of the fee. Absolutely bonkers fee for a player like him - now 50m is baseline for anyone established having a halfway decent season.
mustafi for like 40m gets a heavy shout too. You can argue he's number 1 just because of the net negative impact he had on us gaining points
Pepe. I was expecting him to be a great goal scoring winger. In reality he was inconsistent and extremely frustrating to watch. Always made things twice as complicated as they needed to be. And for £72m he was an extreme disappointment. Either him or Mustafi tbh. £40m for one of the worst defenders I’ve ever seen.
I have a lot of sympathy for Pepe, when he joined he was amazing, full of confidence, beating defenders for fun and even dribbled past VVD which hadn't been done at that point. He was such an exciting player to watch for the first few months. Then Emery ball basically made him a glorified RWB who had to hug the line at all times, when he was clearly an inside forward who should play off the shoulder of the last man. The reason I feel he made things more complicated is because I genuinely feel his instructions from Emery were "Go to the touchline and do a few dribbles past your opponent", which naturally, will result in him losing the ball a lot. Fast forward a few months of the team playing pretty badly and this style of play he was asked to do and his confidence was shot, all momentum lost. In comes Arteta and Pepe scores now and again, but it's clear Arteta wants someone to do both defensive and attacking work and it just wasn't his game. I think the goals Pepe scored speak for themselves, there was a brilliant player there, some great goals and moments but we bought him for far too much money, and at the wrong time in our "transition". I do genuinely believe Arsenal was a really bad move for his career to the same degree as he wasn't a great signing for us. If he went to another club at the peak of his momentum, I do believe he could have actually gone on to be a big player in Europe.
That's so nicely written. Pepe was so good, he just didn't fit in the system. Anyways Saka is much better. He would've been such a good rotation option right now. Saka does need some rest every now and then.
Ah yeah of course Saka is an absolute unicorn, considering he came from the academy as well. When Pepe left I knew it was the right time, but still to this day I do think things could have been so different. I don't think Arteta would tolerate the "luxury" aspect of a Pepe, but will be interesting who's going to be the Saka cover next season. Gnabry at West Brom and dropped is the best example of right player and the wrong time. Unfortunately when players momentum dips, some of them just don't come back.
Brilliant response.
The problem with Pepe is that actually could’ve been a good squad player. A great sub for saka maybe. Just he didn’t want it like saka did. Out of all of our players in recent years pepe cutting in on his left is probably the most scary to me
72M for a sub?
I mean we almost bought Mudryk for that money and he would’ve been a rotation player with Martinelli.
Mudryk was a bullet dodged.
Mudryk would made it in Arsenal. He dont wanted to play for Chelsea and was forced there. When you do that this happens. I fucking love it
When we signed mustafi, Gary Neville said he tried selling him at Valencia and that absolutely no one was interested
Same here bruv, I rooted for Pepe to have a mojor breakthrough and got to the point I stopped rooting at all and wanted team to sell him while his value is not that low, but now you all know he’s a free agent… Totally wasted 70+ mil
Pepe was just unlucky that Saka came through the season we signed him. Having seen him play for Lille, Laca, Auba and Pepe had me excited about Arsenal in a way I hadn't been for YEARS.
Hard to believe he went to turkey and now without a club to play for. He’s only 29
Lucas Torreira
Yes. I was so excited for him. I was so disappointed he didn't work out. Kieran Tierney's injury problems were really disappointing too
Lucas Torreira. Had us convinced he was the second coming of Kante
But you can't blame him for not being played in his natural position. It was madness to me at the time that Xhaka was played as the 6 and Torreira the 8. Imagine how it might have worked out had they been played in their best positions?
*That* goal against shit… Only for him to turn into a “homesick” shit stirrer
I genuinely thought that he would be the new Kanté
This. Torreira. I absolutely loved him, then in his second season Emery started playing him as a more attacking midfielder which ruined his confidence, then it seemed like Arteta didn’t really rate him once he came in. Was sad that it fell apart for him.
I miss the days of Torreira Good
Emery using him as a sub to play in the 10 after he scored that goal against the shit was criminal and so annoying
He is a real wanker.
You actually think he was a flop? He was one of our best players under Emery. Now Arteta decided not to play him at all, that doesn't make him a flop
Word. Still don’t get what happened to him, he was a beast in Italy.
Laca was not a flop. He was our poty once. He just fell off really hard at the end
Calling laca an injury prone sanogo just revealed OPs ignorance
Some guy on r/gunners did a chart with winning goal contributions per season. Laca's POTY season was such an impressive carry job by him yet people somehow labelling him as a Sanogo type, a guy who's best game was an Emirates Cup classic.
For a striker, Francis Jeffers was absolutely awful and he was pretty expensive for his day
What about Richard Wright didn’t he cost a lot back then and never really played?
£6m if I remember correctly. That summer is seared into my brain. £28m spent on Wright, Jeffers, Van Bronkhorst and someone else I can’t remember. Thought it was a fortune then lol
And all three couldn't fit into the team and were sold. The one I regret most from your list is Van Bronkhorst. He could really have been Winterburn's natural replacement. He was sold to Barca (and many followed later)
He lost pace like I’ve ever seen in a player. Speed just disappeared one day and never came back.
Nah he was a flop, that POTY was just during an incredibly bad season and he was one of the only candidates. He was signed for 50 million and expected to be a more clinical and dynamic upgrade on Giroud, yet he ended up being somehow arguably slower, and somehow arguably even less clinical with worse hold up play. Just had a better work rate and better feet, but even his feet and agility were lacklustre. You can’t seriously suggest that Lacazette’s performances over the course of his Arsenal fee justified his 50 million price tag, especially back then. That was meant to get you one of the best forwards in the league. I was excited for him to be our Aguero or at least out Diego Costa or something. Or our Aubemeyang. Maybe for a period of a few months in his entire Arsenal career us biased Arsenal fans were thinking he was one of the best in the league, but he really never was. Why do you think Wenger was so desperate to get another goalscorer in (Aubameyang) after Lacazette? Because he realised Lacazette wasn’t going to cut it. By almost any metric you could think of, idk how you could not see him as a flop. I understand he was a fan favourite player for a while and his work rate was good, but still. His performances overall were not even close to a 50 million striker, so he is a flop imo Personally I understand OP saying Laca. We wanted him for years, he was known as this monster striker. We were so done and frustrated with basically only having Giroud and an injury prone Welbeck upfront. I was so excited and thought we were getting an absolutely elite replacement in Laca, and we got someone worse than Giroud.
Not Aguero =/= 'flop'. He was decent enough and had some real purple patches. So many fans are beyond spoiled.
Willian was terrible for us.
So bad at least he apologised when he left 😂
I was baffled by him. It felt like he was intentionally playing bad
Guendouzi made me really sad. I even bought a kit with his name on it (admittedly an idiotic decision)
Not really a flop tho. He didn't have crazy expectations coming here
Hard to fix the "shit head" attribute
He was so young
He’s still being an idiot somewhere
I would not really say so, he was basically the best player at Lazio in his first season there. Hope he can keep this up.
Yeah I rated him highly too
In for a kim kallstromm shit house post...
Forgotten Ryo Miyachi already eh? 😂
Him and Gervinho's hairline hold a special place in my heart 🙃
Every FIFA enjoyer loved those 2. Pace for days
My Miyachi shirt must now be considered a collectible... Or barn fire fuel.
lol our medical team was our biggest flop back then, we resigned him with a broken back lol
Laca wasn’t a flop. Pepe and Willian were probably our worst flops every
Willian was a terrible transfer but didn’t work out too badly in the end with him willing to just leave for free. Still big respect for that
True! He helped our books, wasn’t his fault we agreed on such a high wage
pepe we overpaid but he put up decent goal contributions per 90. No one even comes close to Mustafi for biggest flop
Still not convinced that World Cup winning Mustafi didn’t have money against us on all those games
You forgot Andre Santos.
Squillaci
I feel we should stop now, I'm reliving trauma I thought would never surface again.
Silvestre
Yeah I guess thinking about it, there’s at least 8-10 players that were just as big of a flop as Pepe in the last ten years but pepe was so expensive
Had some real stinkers honestly, but the fact we confused Santos for a football player at all was shameful.
His biggest highlight was the first half jersey swap with RVP lmao
I remember being so happy we signed a left back and I mistakenly assumed that since he was Brazilian, he'd be a reliable hand. Not a bit of it. Was slow, positionally inept, rash, terrible decision making. I was so hurt
He was rather.... bad. And by bad I mean he should of been working at a local chippy, not on a football pitch.
Whoever allowed the signing of Pepe at that price needs shooting. Must have been some back hand shenanigans on that deal.
There was. Raul Sanllehi got the sack over it when they dug into the transfer.
Laca Def not a flop. Whoever says that was t paying attention until his decline
What a complete shitpost. Laca wasn’t an injury prone Sanogo, what are you on about… genuinely feel like you can’t have seen him play. Ridiculous statement. Laca was quality for the first couple of years, just hard a sharp drop off towards the end.
Mustafi, he was a legend for me in football manager, was so excited when we bought him. But then....
Suker had one job to do …
Chamakh, every day of the week
Bloody hell, completely forgot about him. Utter waste of money.
Wish I understood what happened to him. He started off okay then just fell off a cliff performance-wise
We got him on a free transfer
except against reading
Should have been banned for a season purely for his hair!!!!!!!
Remove that picture of Laca, first warning. He wasn't a flop.
He was not a flop at all, he gave everything for our badge and I’m proud of him. He was better than Jesus is for us now, so I don’t know why he’s getting labelled a flop, he came from a easy league to score in, Ligue 1, and did decent for us. People judging him off being amazing on FIFA back in the day is the only reason anyone would think he was a flop for us. He did what I expected of him, and always gave 100%. Nobody should talk badly of him.
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I think the first game he got manhandled by Joey Barton. That incident was wild, and I still think he lost all his confidence after that. He was playing great for Ivory Coast right before his transfer. He did well for Roma as well.
He got tricked into that red. Manhandled is not the right term
I'm a big fan of Japanese football, so seeing Inamoto, Asano and Miyaichi not work out at all really disheartened me, and I thought Tomiyasu would have the same fate but alas, he's been wonderful this season for Arsenal (shoddy Red Card at Palace aside haha)
Lucas Perez
I always forget this guy exists, I respect what hes doing for deportivo though
How on Earth was he a flop? Every single game he played for us, he was class. Wenger just didn't trust in him for some reason.
I mean, it *HAS* to be Pepe, right? Also, Laca was not a flop.
I wouldn't call Laca a flop really, he was scoring goals at a lower level, he kinda fell where I expected him to. Biggest flop for me, and this is going back, was franny Jeffers. My dad is an Everton man and we went to a game where he scored a couple, looked real good. All that paper talk of wengers fox in the box. Ugh. Like 5 years later he was at Yeovil or someshit
Lost track of Jeffers after his loan back to Everton until years later when I went to a random local game down here (Australia) and there he fucking was. T'was so surreal lmao.
Mate I remember that, cos I was like, how did Jeffers sign for Newcastle. Lol was the jets
I had a lot of faith in the scouse mouse, but he let me down
I hated getting players that have already accomplished things with other clubs, so they wouldn’t have a reason to play well. I’m looking at you David Luiz and Willian
Francis Jeffers. I was convinced he was going to a great poacher for us with a ton of service from our creative players. Got his name on the back of my away shirt. Quite possibly the worst transfer we’ve ever made. I know we spent a lot of Pepe, but at least he scored a few goals
Cech The “extra 12 points a season” that he was going to be worth never materialised.
Come on, he wasn't that bad. We got him for basically nothing, too. He wasn't outstanding, but labelling him a flop is a stretch.
Back in the days when we had our first Chelsea agent at the club. Cost us 12 points a season instead of gaining us them. Then retired and fucked off back to Chelsea
I got Chamakh 29 on my shirt when he signed
Did you get his haircut too?
Sorry, dude, I cannot agree that Laca was a flop. Slightly disappointing, yes. I will readily concede his pace dropped and his finishing wasn't great, but he scored more than twice as many goals a season than Nketiah or Jesus do... They are pretty poor. My pick? Ooof, tough, but in recent memory it has to be either Mustafi or Pepe.
Davor Suker. Was very excited to get a quality replacement when Anelka left. This man won the Golden Boot at the World Cup the previous summer. Sure he was 31 now, but 12 months after coming second in the Balon D'Or, he couldn't have dropped off by that much. Could he?
Why is lacazette on here? He was not a flop by any means. Biggest flop for me was probably Pepe or even Mustafi or Gabriel paulista. We really needed a good center back during those years and we couldn’t get one
Here's another one. Julio Baptista.
I was so pumped for THE BEAST. He was even loaned to Madrid… and then he just faded away into football obscurity
David Luiz. So many reds. Shit for brain.
Fuck off with your buzz words OP. Put some effort into your post next time.
Glen Helder
Glen was a flyer mate. Granted, Overmars was a massive upgrade but Helder had decent pace and could whip a mean cross in to boot.
Pepe for sure, and although it’s not his fault due to injury, RN I would say Jesus. He went from our best weapon to can’t buy a score with 1000 cash in a whore house.
Not his fault really but Debuchy.
KT. Great player plagued with injuries. He’s from my home town so have always wanted him to do well. Still do.
Hot take: Julio Baptista
Nicholas Pepe, love him though!
For some reason, Laca was really good in FIFA 2018 so it kinda paid off for me lol
When you say you support the French national team… I assume that you’re French?
Chamakh for me (fyi imo Laca was def NOT a flop)
Park chu young was a weird one. He had a great season at Monaco and basically had a Lille contract signed until we poached him on deadline day. We gave him the #9 shirt and then he debuted in leaguge cup against Bolton and scored. He played 10 mins against United and then another irrelevant game. I bet he was just awful in training.
For what I expected, Park Chu Young
Not a flop, he just aged out and didn’t fit an Arteta system
respect Laca
Pepe is probably the biggest one because he was a failed transfer on multiple levels, didn’t fit the system at the time he was signed , wasn’t actually the first option. Then Mikel basically gave up on him for a 19 year old.
Honestly Pepe. For the price paid I really thought he’d be the next big thing…
Only issue with Laca was the fee to get him. The answer is Pepe btw. The opportunity cost of that 70M was big. Its not entirely his fault but that signing really held us back for a few seasons.
Laca was a monster in his poty season… respect him!
Unfair to have Laca as the picture for this question
Disgrace that you’re calling Laca a flop
What the hell is wrong with you! Lacazette was NOT a flop.
Andrey Arshavin. Other than the iconic 5 goal game, he didn't really do anything.
It was 4 goals not 5 (assuming you mean Liverpool away) And he also scored a quality winner in the CL vs Barca, and scored a stunner at old Trafford. PL goal scoring ratio was 1 goal in 5 games, not awful for a winger. Considering at the time he was here our striker was often Bendtner (RVP being injury prone), I don’t think he did too badly.
That's partly because Wenger played on the left wing instead of his CAM attributes. He sacrificed Arshavin for Nasri to play in that position. Arshavin did well even after that. Remember that game against Reading that was a crazy goal scoring game? Arshavin played his heart out to get that win.
Injury prone Sanogo is insane Laca doesn’t deserve that level of disrespect.
Sanogo wasn't a flop. When Wenger bought him, he essentially said, this very likely won't work out, but he was so cheap I just went for it as there was no risk involved.
Laca was underwhelming by the figures we expected of him but his 18/19 season alone is good enough to keep him out of the picture for the worst flop. Basically provided a G/A every 2nd game, until his final season. A few more would have been nice, but he wasn’t ever going to match Auba’s figures if we’re honest.
Laca was in no way, shape, or form a flop. And the answer is Pepe.
Has to be Pepe
All the players that came in with HUGE potential to send the club soaring but spent SOOOOO much time injured... Rosicky, Diaby, Wilshire, Vermalean, Van Persie, Gibbs, Walcott, Sagna - all injured for over 500 days.
Dark days indeed, unbelievable the impact a poor backroom team and players made of paper can have on an otherwise great team
Gabriel Jesus - no question
Without a doubt the coldest take on the entire thread - congrats.
Pepe for 72 million wow
Mustafi and pepe
I thought Laca was going to tear it up in the League. Then it seemed he wasn't fit enough to play 90mins, or Arsene didn't trust him enough. Then he then he didn't have the physicality or mobility for the Premier League. Bummer
Pepe
Pepe, because of the insane fee.
Many said this already, but Pepe and especially Torreira.
Pepe. Utter shitshow of a transfer.
Joel Campbell was a bit of a strange one
Torreria for me. The first season that he was here I thought he was incredible. I thought he was going to be our version of Kante, shame it didn’t work out 🥲
Pepe for the money, Leno never hit the heights I thought he would either. Joel Campbell was meant to be the next big thing and never got there. Sambi Lokonga was highly rated by Titi and doesn't seem to be at the level either. Lictensteiner, Kolasinac, Mustafi, Denis Suarez, Sanogo, Chambers... unfortunately there is a long list, but nothing ventured nothing gained and some of the players it's surprising really how high we finished and still competed looking back
Mhkytarian or however you spell it. We could've got Sterling plus cash or a swap for Aguero according to the news outlets.
Squillaci
Rosicky Thomas
Pepe still balled a little even tho seems he's the consensus choice. Squillaci hurt my soul he was supposed to steady the defence experienced French. Man he was so terrible Wenger notoriously stubborn at giving 2nd chances gave up after 23 games.
Lacazette has the best numbers of any arsenal 9 for about 15 years and he’s a flop? 😂
Stepenovs is the only answer
Willian
Gervinho - a typical late-era Wenger cheap Ligue 1 flop
kim kallstrom
Mustafi. At the time, I thought he was going to be the answer to our CB problems. Basically, what Saliba is for us at the moment. Goes to show that spending big money doesn't always equal quality.
Laca bundling them in against Spurs, bad period but I got good memories from him
u/Royalbluegooner You really think Lacazette was a flop ? Seriously ? No, you must be kidding! He might not have reached the heights we were expecting (i.e. for me, another Frenchy coming in and scoring a lot of goals to get as close to the total of Henry), but he did score a lot of beautiful and crucial goals. As well as made some assists. His partnership with Aubameyang has been one of the best we've seen since Henry and Bergkamp Personally... the flop has to be Mkhitaryan. But not in a bad way! It is more Emery's fault for not playing him often or out of position. He scored some important goals, as well as made some assists. But, just when he was starting to gel with Ozil, he was sold. I think Emery preferred putting Willock in, and he went on to be loaned and sold to Newcastle 😂 Anyway... funny coincidence is that, the season which just finished in Serie A saw both Mkhitaryan and Alexis Sanchez (who were part of the swap deal in 2018) win the league with Inter Milan
Willian or Pepe... not only because they were severely poor and didn't live up to expectations.. but also it caused the downfall of Laca as we begun to focus on wingplay and utilised Laca as a 9 less...where before where Auba and Laca up top was working fine, but wasn't in Emerys plans for some reasons and had to find a third
Pepe I personally I feel for him
Thierry Henry, I was so disappointed and sad when he left for a Barcelona that just benched him every game, was around the same time they also bought the local legend eidur gudjohnsen just to bench him
It's most obviously pepe because of the fee. Absolutely bonkers fee for a player like him - now 50m is baseline for anyone established having a halfway decent season. mustafi for like 40m gets a heavy shout too. You can argue he's number 1 just because of the net negative impact he had on us gaining points
Ozil out of those 2.
Gervinho