My favourite player of all time 
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Same here.
Such a great personality, always came across as a proper decent chap and just incredible talent. Probably one of the best dribblers and close control we’ve had at the club, just so hard to get ball off and so press resistant.
I wish he was 10 years younger and playing for us now.
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Absolutely brilliant player. I’ll always remember the time that PSG based their entire game on doubling and even tripling up on Santi and they still couldn’t clamp him.
Genuinely felt as if he was as good as any cm in football at the time yss inclusive of Modric and Xavi. Magician.
Yet Wenger would bench him for Wilshere at times.
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When did that happen?
Plenty. This is when I started to lose faith in Wenger. It began with Santi being shifted back wide a fair bit to accomdate Jack and then there were times when Wilshere would be preferred.
Definitely happened for a patch. Hated it.
Not sure on the exact time line but know it was following a lengthy Wilshere injury, the team was doing well and him coming back in disrupted the team.
Come on there’s no way on earth Santi was ever as good as any CM in the world.
If you rank him purely as a CM he falls behind the major Spanish midfielders of his era. Cesc, Alonso, Xavi, Iniesta all coke above him.
Great player for Arsenal but think Arsenal fans romanticise about him too much. Was never an elite central midfielder probably fell a tier below the top players
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Ability wise, he is as good as pretty much anything I’ve seen. I’m talking ability. Obviously Xavi, Pirlo, Alonso etc were better because they proved it at the top level.
Was his career anywhere near as distinguished? Of course not. I don’t think Madrid would have been worse for having Santi at CM instead of Kroos.
I probably should have been clearer with what I originally said.
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Santi was one of the best dribblers I’ve seen at Arsenal but he wasn’t an elite passer, often over dribbled the ball to where he’d make a pass too late.
He was the type of player who’d get dispossessed in midfield dribbling and it wouldn’t deter him from doing the same thing again and again.
Great player but just not really at that elite level for me. Talk about Kroos but let’s be honest his passing range far surpasses Santi’s and he was a key part of one of the most successful midfielders in the history of the game. Drop him out and lose a mega part of that success.
I actually think his best position was along the attacking lines rather than centre of the pitch. Think that’s where we need to be talking about his quality.
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That’s fair and most would probably agree. Think Santi is up there with the most press resistant cms that I’ve seen. Could pass or dribble his way out of trouble. I think I just don’t rate Kroos like most - always saw him as a broke man’s Alonso.
Santi at Villareal was pretty attacking, somewhat so at Malaga as well.
It might be bias - I just loved the guy. He was a level below Modric, Xavi, Iniesta, Pirlo etc. Could have played in any of their teams imo.
I mean he played with Coquellin
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Santi was on par with Ronaldinho. I don’t think this can be denied.
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Ronaldinho wasn’t two-footed.
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No footballer is better than Santi Cazorla.
I am also chewing very loudly with my mouth open right now
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He was a mediocre footballer.
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Santi > Busquets, I say it.
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The absolute state of this thread.
Santi wasn’t even that good. Coquelin gets such a raw deal. “Santi carried him” etc. Nah, wasn’t much between them talent wise.
2 completely different players lol
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Santi and Coquelin worked well but if we had actually paired Santi with someone who wasn’t a total zero in possession imagine what we could have achieved.
Probably the same as we achieved then. Did you see the rest of our squad?