IMO, the best language of football, is the understanding of the game.
If you know the tactics, the flow, the movement and your teammates, you don’t really need to talk much. Single words like “pass”, “dummy”, “man on”… are already enough.
You think players from great European clubs all speak the same language? No way.
But great players understand the game better than anybody.
I’m ok with this when it comes to attacking players but good communication is absolutely vital when it comes to defence. It’s all about organisation, discipline and timing.
You could tell Gabriel was absolutely lost when you watched him play for us and not being able to speak English nor having any desire to learn it set him back hugely.
Yeah he always looked as if he was thrashing around in the dark. How fucking amazing is it though that we’ve ended up with Mustafi for 35m and they’ve got Gabriel for pennies compared to that. I mean he isn’t Van Dijk but he sure ain’t Mustafi either.
He was average at best. One in the long list of cheap signings we made in hope that he might come good one day.
His career at Arsenal was truly fucked by Diego Costa and Mike Dean. He had built up decent form going into that game, but his confidence was absolutely shattered after the sending off and he never recovered.
I always remember him proactively giving ammunition for Diego Costa to get him sent off.
It’s vital at defence dude. One of the reasons Cech has great rep even after declining in physical skill is his ability to speak many languages. Tight situations in your own box require you to be quick-witted and talking to each other.
Plus, living in a country you barely know the language of isn’t that nice.
Yeh they definitely done way better and tbf to Paulista he certainly looks more comfortable in a league where Portuguese and Spanish are more prevalent than English.
Once again it’s just us getting twatted by StatDNA and sticking square pegs in round holes. I honestly feel we need to start looking within our own league for fixes, I just never understood Wenger’s indifference to buying from the Premiership, it was some seriously hipster bullshit.
Comparing him favourably with Big Shkod via the Valencia is about as far as I’ll go with this romanticising of Gabriel.
Yes he’s improved for Valencia but for us he was king of the individual error, the Mustafi of his time. His time here was a complete failure
Iirc this guy was our first stat dna signing. Wenger didn’t trust him whatsoever so as he points out his opportunities were few and far between. I loved his attitude, he didn’t take shit from guys like Costa, but he was just too dumb to use it to his advantage.
This
Every centre back Arsenal had since Gallas, including Gallas, has been berated for their ‘ability’ for making mistakes. Makes you think.
Yea that’s the point, he didn’t learn anything to communicate on the pitch and you need a way more wider vocablery than that, ie ‘drop back’ ‘press up for offside’ ‘mark x player’ ‘high line’ ‘low block’ etc
Also you can’t even know the tactics effectively if you don’t know the language
It makes me think alright. I think they are all a bunch of cunts. Except Kos.
Fuck. That’s bad on my part. I love Per. Sorry Per. xxx
Communication is on both side, I won’t put the blame on one but the others not taking any blame.
Right so in your view it’s not the persons fault who can’t be bothered to learn the languages that’s at fault it’s everyone elses fault for not learning his language? Does that make sense? And in actual fact, they did try to learn bits of Portugese and Spanish to talk to him.
His fault or not, I don’t know.
Did the club make it mandatory to learn English or you can’t play? Seems not.
Correct me if I am wrong, Monreal doesn’t speak (or speak good) English also.
Not that everyone is a language genius. Some takes only a short time to master it and some takes years…
As a footballer, I want him to spend more time and concentrate more on footballing skills.
I think the language issue as it relates to playing football is exaggerated; however, I think it does come into play in training the finer points and trying to get everyone on same page on tactics, etc.
Also, it just seems to me (my bias), that if you move to a country and are surrounded by professionals (coaches, players, etc) that speak that country’s language predominantly, I just don’t understand not having massive motivation to learn the language and be able to participate in that society to its fullest, but that’s just me…
I won’t have a doubt if Gabriel could not speak and communicate in fluent English, but can’t believe if he did not know any of the common footballing terms at all.