iSporter Asif Khan believes that Croatian striker Eduardo's move from Arsenal to Shakhtar Donetsk will be good for his long term career and Arsenal's immediate requirements.
I was and I am a big Eduardo fan, both before and after his horrific injury. No Arsenal fan or a football fan for that matter could bear to take the injury suffered by the Croatian while playing for Arsenal against Birmingham.
It was a vicious and horrific challenge by Birmingham's Martin Taylor and for the best of the attempts of the English press to try and justify such challenges as a part of a physical English approach to the game, the fact remains that it was malicious and vicious challenge by an English player who was trying to make up for a lack talent by being overly physical, where else have we heard that before??
Why am I bringing this topic up and discussing it at length? My intention is to talk about Eduardo's departure from Arsenal, but the departure is clearly and directly linked with what happened on that fateful day in Birmingham.
A lot of things went wrong for Arsenal on that day, but clubs as entities can move on and loss of a player of any magnitude can be overcome with time. Sadly, its not the same for the players.
Eduardo lost valuable time and was lucky to be able to make a comeback. The comeback was no less than miraculous, he scored twice against Cardiff City in the his first senior game since injury in an FA Cup tie and scored again in his first Premier League game.
But it didn't turn out to be a fairly tail with a happily ever after ending, after the initial promise he clearly struggled to make his place permanent in the first team squad and it was time before Arsene Wenger had to take a call.
While I would have loved to see him stay at Arsenal and make his mark again, the way things have been with the Gunners in the last couple of years I believe its for Eduardo's good that he made a move to Ukrainian giants Shakhtar Donetsk.
Arsenal have too many nimble footed, diminutive front line players and a surplus of strikers. While the list of strikers is impressive, they have highly underperformed in the last couple of years. With Eduardo struggling to get back to his pre-injury standards, Robin Van Persie seems to be the only top class striker in the squad.
The likes of Carlos Vela and Nicklas Bendtner have promised a lot but delivered little in terms of performances in the first team. The likes of Vela and Bendtner have age on their side and they can afford to spend a season or two of not being a regular in the first team, the same cannot be said about Eduardo. At 27 he is not past it, but is at an age where he needs to play regular football and win trophies.
Arsene Wenger was forced to bring in Marouane Chamakh from Bordeaux to prop the striking department. While Chamakh is still untested in England he has all the required attributes to complement Van Persie or fill in for him when needed.
The arrival of Chamakh clearly left Eduardo in a tough spot, he was already struggling to get a starting place in the team and the new arrival meant his first team chances would do down further.
A player of his class and quality shouldn't be satisfied with bench warming duties and a new environment might just give him the required impetus to get back to his best and that is scoring truck load of goals!
While l and I sure all other Arsenal fans will miss Eduardo in the Premier League, we wish him the best of luck in his new endeavour and hope that he regains the same form that convinced Arsene Wenger to bring him to the Emirates.
Subscribe to this comment's feed
Show/hide comments
a guest
said:
 |
... bad luck that is is still not out of injury fully but i think he is a super clinical striker.............. |
Asif Khan
said:
|
... He is offcourse a superb striker, its just a shame that the injury ruined his career! |
Saurabh Joshi
said:
|
... Asif... I completely agree... I think it takes a lot for a player to comeback from such disaster... i think it was good that this didnt happen at the emirates coz in that case he would have shivered every time he would have taken field over there... cheers!! |
Show/hide comment form
| < Prev | Next > |
|---|
