Noni Madueke: Page 61 - The Arsenal discussion forum and community: One more in the Tolly

Noni Madueke

RowJimmy

awooga83
I think what it actually tells us is that the club has different criteria that they're looking at than "end product" (otherwise know as counting stats) and that players like Madueke are part of the mix of what they want.
I say this because if it had just been a bad signing he'd be stuck on the bench, and he's not. He's doing what Mikel wants him to do.

awooga83

RowJimmy not necessarily managers do sometimes struggle to accept they might have got it wrong, like is all they are human. If you buy a forward and scoring and assisting isn't the priority I don't understand what your requirement is but it can't be about inducing the attack. It's like targeting a defensive player who doesn't defend effectively.

RowJimmy

awooga83
Arteta is brutally self-critical IMO. I suspect the inside of his head is not an easy place.
I think Arteta is probably looking at stats like @-- posted. It's an approach based on a lot of analysis and very different, I think, to the way supporters experience the game.

Burnwinter

awooga83 He wasn't a player without data to make a call on so why did we end up doing it and for that outlay

It was because of the data we signed Madueke. A lot of his data is actually still top echelon. Here's the Cannon Stats report from last summer that swayed my view on him.

https://www.cannonstats.com/p/stats-scouting-noni-madueke

Now, if you go through the past season, his shot volume, xG per shot, 1-on-1s and carries etc are still top tier. He's still pumping out just shy of 3.0 shots per 90. You just don't want to look at his post-shot xG added, creativity, or overall effectiveness. But you can see why the Madueke experiment was undertaken.

awooga83

Burnwinter even if you concede that, coming off a bad few seasons at Chelsea and them effectively wanting to sell and like you say taking it as an experiment because there was lots of risk in it not coming off I don't why we quickly matched their asking price. You should be factoring in we are taking a risk so it needs to cost less. Given the apparent approach to other transfers that's not consistent.

Even in the scouting post there is commentary this was a great Initial action but the final action wasn't great. So it's not like you couldn't forsee certainly on output it was a big gamble.

Gazza M

44 new posts since i last opened this thread. lack of solid transfer news is killing us

Burnwinter

awooga83 even if you concede that, coming off a bad few seasons at Chelsea and them effectively wanting to sell and like you say taking it as an experiment because there was lots of risk in it not coming off I don't why we quickly matched their asking price

Well, we can't know, but I'd presumed wages and the ease of the transfer because Chelsea are a horse-trading club that's just down the road. The player was already in London, had friends in our dressing room, and wanted to come to Arsenal. That's also how we ended up with Jorginho and then Havertz.

It's not a case of "even if you concede that": signing players with exceptional traits or underlying numbers, that for whatever reason are not regarded as high performers or complete packages, that's a fair description of how moneyball gets done. If you only want to sign Vinicius, you'll sign very few misfits.

But even now if Madueke finds his brain we'll have a highly valuable player on our hands, as opposed to one that's merely valuable. Let's not forget his fee was less than the one being proposed to us for Ezri Konsa, and not much more than we paid for Vieira.

awooga83

Burnwinter accepting your position above. If it wasn't to take a gamble as you say I still don't understand why we didn't put in a lower bid and if Chelsea said you pay our overvaluation or walk away why didn't we walk away. All the stuff we've said about uncertainty for the big buys we were linked to would absolutely apply to Noni and even more because he'd been coming off a pretty bad moment.

Burnwinter

awooga83

Don't know, but honestly, if the size of this debate is "the experiment was acceptable at £40m but not £50m" that's good enough for me, quibbling over £10m is par for the course in football nowadays. A week ago the £75m for Guimarães was £10m too high … now it looks worth it.

There's really two issues here we've been arguing over, Madueke and Nwaneri. My take on the former is he's been a lot less amazing than I'd hoped but comparing him to, say, Vieira as a signing does create a certain perspective.

My take on the latter is that he's a wonderful talent but all signs suggest to me he's not going to make it at Arsenal … most likely he's just not quite the all-round superstar we have hoped. The proof would be how he progressed if he were transferred.

My take on the two together is that Madueke being on the books doesn't have much to do with Nwaneri staying or going. There's only a transient financial benefit in this whole "pure profit" bit, because if Nwaneri is really good enough to make it at Arsenal, his quality costs Arsenal more leaving than it does arriving. So unless we're so short on PSR headroom the timing of funds is the issue, I can't see money being the reason Nwaneri is transfer listed.

Final point is to recall things are not as they seem to fans. For instance, Nwaneri's loan to Marseille was painted as the club exiling him. Later it emerged the player's entourage had insisted he be loaned. Arteta is not an idiot despite seeming like one at times. Maybe he can't offer good faith guarantees to Nwaneri that he will play, and so Nwaneri's people are once again rattling the cages, and they want Arsenal to allow his transfer.

In general, if a player is against being sold or happy to stay put, the agent involved briefs the press about it, as Martinelli's has done. I haven't seen Nwaneri's agent briefing that out …

awooga83

Well for me he's a 30m player at risk so 50 is nearly 60% more to pay for him, in proportion terms not out of whack with where we've been saying it's too much. Again it's that lack of constituency which makes me question the whole idea that we are these excellent judgers of value and that drives us.

Claudius

awooga83 how many R30m attackers made it into the England team?

awooga83

Claudius no idea, doesn't effect the valuation for me. Lots of higher valued players didn't make the England squad as well.

JazzG

Gunner89 What makes this funny coming from a Chelsea fan is I can't see a single a Chelsea wide player on that list...

Claudius

awooga83 let me jog your memory. The forwards were Saka, Rogers, Kane, Rashford, Watkins, Gordon and Madueke.

awooga83

Claudius bit ut doesn't really matter who the others are though in terms of his valuation. Do you think Madueke is currently going to be sold for 50m

Qwiss

Claudius the England argument is pointless. Should we ring Chelsea and see if they want to swap Henderson for Myles?

RowJimmy

We already bought him. Do you think we should push him out?

awooga83

RowJimmy I think if you're trying to be a top club at the elite of the sport you have to be ruthless. If you have a player who doesn't meet the level you move them on. Now if your position is we deliberately bought a forward who doesn't score or assist with any regularity then we can be happy. I just don't believe that's what Arsenal as a top club would be doing. So yes you move on the players who aren't where we need them. Especially if there is a desire to make sales or looks like an obvious one.

RowJimmy

awooga83
Including - assuming your assessment of his value is correct - if we take a £20M cash loss and a £15M accounting loss on the sale?

awooga83

RowJimmy I mean we are going to take a loss that's what happens if you overpay but sometimes you have to suck that up when you get it wrong. Similar to what may happen with Jesus we need him moved on and it could end up costing us but that's the consequence of giving that massive contract.

But your perspective of why me may not sell him is fair, he's been a bit of a disaster and it's going to be financially damaging so we just keep him as we've done with many other players in recent times.

« Previous Page Next Page »