Xhaka - worst buy in recent history? - The Arsenal discussion forum and community: One More in the Tolly

Xhaka - worst buy in recent history?

lorddulaarsenal

This guy not only serves up tosh performances week in week out but given the stature of his signing it's a signing that's setting us back a few years.

Instead of fixing the midfield issues with a top well rounded midfielder we yet again have a flawed player in a key position. He won't be dropped until it's so obvious to Wenger that he's just not good enough.

Basically we're strapped into an unbalanced first eleven for the next three years

JazzG

He's low on confidence right now, thought he finished last season really well. Not the worst player but the fact we are relying upon him to screen our defence to me shows we have the wrong expectations from him. Has he ever excelled doing that? Doesn't look comfortable defensively now and from what I can gather never was great in that role before.

We've got an unbalanced squad and end up playing players with the wrong kind of partners on the pitch. All points to a very disorganised club on and off the pitch.

Gazza M

i'm giving him until christmas to show some value, but it's feeling pretty academic at this stage

signing a player of his purported skillset was wise in theory i.e. an alonso-style tall deep lying midfielder. in practice it's been pretty disastrous. one thing i didn't quite expect was how little appetite for physical contests he has. i didn't picture him as a great ball winner, but someone that at least had a willingness and ability to compete in 50-50 duels. he's actually pretty soft, which allied to his lack of athleticism makes him the wrong candidate to succeed in the current epl

Klaus

I think he's in with a good shout yeah. Xhaka came with a big reputation. He has never, not even in isolated games, looked like the player he was advertised to be.

It's possible for a lot of people to be wrong at the same time, and maybe that is the case here. There were a ton of fans and pundits who vouched for him. Xhaka wouldn't be the first one unable to replicate his form from a weaker league; they spoke of Anderson like he was Ronaldinho mk II in Portugal and about Salomon Kalou like he was Henry's heir when he was playing for Feyenoord, and I never saw 90 good minutes of football from either one of them in their entire Premier League careers.

Either way Xhaka has become a symbol for our inept scouting at this stage. We spent a ton of time and money watching him across multiple seasons, we held off on replacing Arteta for years because Wenger was obsessed with finding "the right quality", and then we ended up getting it wrong anyway when we finally moved on a target. And now we're stuck with a malfunctioning midfield because we almost never shift players when they don't work out. There seems to be some weird three-season rule to our transfer business.

The single biggest argument for getting rid of Wenger last summer wasn't that we dropped out of the top four. It was so someone else could come in and kick all these underperforming players out the door. Our squad is a mess because we've rewarded them with new deals and playing time for years. The fact that Xhaka still turns out for us every weekend is just the insescapable conclusion of this attitude. He would have been way down the pecking order right now at any other big club in the country.

Ray

I agree with that, also you could replace Xhaka with Ozil in your post and it still stands true for me. They're not suited for the PL IMO.

flobaba

Yeah, but Ozil has been great. He can be a great player, we know that.

Xhaka is just an average duddite. Hugely disappointing.

MuswellHillGooner

I think xhaka should be moved higher up the pitch when ozil leaves.

Claudius

Can't compare Ozil and Xhaka. The former is demotivated or ill-disciplined. The latter is talentless. I've never seen a playmaker with no basic mastery of mechanics. Simply put, he cannot aim a ball if either he or the intended recipient is in motion. Coupled with his defensive lapses, such as his inability to predict the movement in the winning goal for Deeney's men, you become painfully aware that we have a lump of coal in central midfield.

We could have had Kante for less. On at least two ocassions. But our broken scouting and transfer system stymied that. And now we are stuck with Xhaka, Coquelin, El Neny and the ghost of Wilshere as our DM options. No top 5 team would accept this.

Clrnc

I remember I was first shocked by how bad and clumsy Xhaka can be when Poland played the Swiss in the last 16 at Euros. Back then there were a few raving about him based on statistics in the group stages and didn't believe he is a potential liability.

I didn't watch Gladbach enough, but most of their fans thought we bought the wrong midfielder and should have went for Dahoud.

flobaba

Remember back in the early links days when we thought him getting all those red cards was a sign of "toughness". 😆

Bold Tone

Clrnc wrote:
...

I didn't watch Gladbach enough, but most of their fans thought we bought the wrong midfielder and should have went for Dahoud.

I remember that and after watching him give Barca a torrid time in the only full game i'd ever seen him play,

i thought he was the closest replacement for Cazorla.
I, however, wrongly assumed Wenger had done his homework and Xhaka would become the DM we had missed for a decade but now i feel we've made an expensive mistake.

Burnwinter

Alarm bells should have been going off about Xhaka when he announced he was a huge Wenger fan.

Segway

I had high hopes for this guy. But you have to say for 35m and the reputation he came with he's been a flop so far. He doesn't compensate for his lack of mobility in any meaningful way. His defensive contribution is lacklustre and even his passing is infuriatingly inconsistent. How many times has he passed the ball out for a throw-in this season?

He ended last season well but he's been pretty horrific so far this season.

Segway

Burnwinter wrote:
Alarm bells should have been going off about Xhaka when he announced he was a huge Wenger fan.

Par for the course for new signings, no?

Alarm bells rung when Wenger described him as a box to box midfielder. Wtf is the point of our scouting even?

Qwiss

He'd do well with a better coach. Theres a player in there, he just doesn't suit the "hey do whatever you like" Wenger style of coaching.

Bring Back Kerrea Gilbert

Can't stand this fool. Strokes the ball beautifully when he's afforded all the time in the world but other than that he's Championship.

Kel Varnsen

Heh, remember saying he looked slow and sluggish before we signed him. It was always unlikely he'd be a success here. He's far too slow, doesn't cover enough space, and isn't good enough on or off the ball to outweigh his big weaknesses.

Herbas

Nowadays I refuse to criticize Arsenal players, because I think they are all massively hindered by Wenger.

goon

Qwiss! wrote:
He'd do well with a better coach. Theres a player in there, he just doesn't suit the "hey do whatever you like" Wenger style of coaching.

Yep, guy has no brains, needs to be told what to do. That being said, he does have some fundamental weaknesses that will only suit a certain style and, it’s not ours.

mdgoonah41

hes been a huge disappointment. however, a few things:

not every player is instinctual and can improvise and figure things out on his own. that doesn't mean they are shit. xhaka might not be suited to playing in a free role where he can just do what he wants. it might be down to his reactions or his vision or whatever else. we're one of the few teams that apparently doesn't really have a rigid, drilled system where everyone has very strict roles. if he was in a better coached team with a more rigid system and the players around him also knew their roles, he might be better.
i wouldn't panic sell him, i would sack the worthless manager and see if installing a new manager, who actually focuses on squad roles, tactics and a more disciplined system would bring out the best in xhaka (and the rest of the squad)

we are a rudderless ship right now, doesn't make sense to throw our assets overboard. better to make the captain of the ship walk the plank and then see what a new leader can do with the players we have.