Yeah at the time we signed him he was scoring plenty of goals in the French youth sides and had a burgeoning reputation.
Turned out to be a really shit player but was worth a punt for the money we paid - IIRC it was basically nothing.
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I only remember laughing because at the time the Higuain hype was at peak and we got Yaya Sanogo.
Fans went ballistic
Worse player to ever wear the shirt. Topped John awful Hawley which I never thought possible.
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He came in on a free. We also nearly signed Mbappe on a free the season he seriously blew up. If only we pulled that one off. He ended up signing for Monaco
Youth players are hard to assess. Ravell Morrison was a bigger talent than Pogba in Uniteds youth system. Thomas Eisfeld was a bigger talent than Gotze in Dortmundâs youth system. Afobe was prolific in the youth side IIRC. Jon Miquel Toral wasnât necessarily a worse talent than Bellerin. None of them made it in the big leagues for different reasons
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Yaya Sanogo, represents the downfall of Wenger and AC
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Sanogoâs 4 goals versus Benfica had me doubting myself.
Ramsey at the heart of the first two goals.
Thought he had 4 goals against BVB in pre-season/Emirates Cup as well?
Nah. I think he scored his first goal versus Dortmund in the Champions League.
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Yaya was scoring goals in the French youth team and was completely free, thats the type of low risk high reward signings we should be making now especially.
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Itâs always a risk worth taking if it doesnât work out it doesnât come at a huge cost to the club. Itâs why, as much as I think Holding is shit, he was a risk worth taking.
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Didnât work though did it. Nice in theory but it canât be used as a main strategy.
You canât cheat the system in this sport. Investment and good appointments. Itâs policies like this instead of a proper player thatâs got us in this mess.
Letâs not laud him as in anyway a success. He ended up being our only forward signing of the summer. It was a tragic decision because of that.
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Agree.
If we have spare budget, yeah, sigh a few.
If we have tight budget, save the money.
This kind of low risk high reward should never ever be the priority of our signings.
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He scored a CL winning goal and assisted a FA Cup winning goal as well. Iâd say for free thats not a bad return. But regardless we werenât making a 50m Fernando Torres striker signing back then, and we still donât get a ready made striker these days either. We spent 50m on Laca 
so yeh these low risk high reward signings are probably the direction we should be taking as they arenât gonna fuck up our finances.
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No Divrock Origi for 10 million pound and scoring a goal in a CL final and contributing to a League title is the sort of chance signing you take. An added option too a squad you try to build.
You donât do it in isolation as a one size fits all like we did with a raw kid.
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Christopher Wreh was one of the best âlimited riskâ striker signings we made, in my opinion.
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Exactly this sort of business. Boa Morte too a degree.
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I know Wreh popped up with some important goals (the winner against those dirty bastards in the cup semi final), but I wonder how many goals he got in total in 1997/98âŚ
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Two according to wikipedia. Both 1 0 wins against the wombles and Bolton.
Wolves in the semi final obviously too.
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Transfermarkt has him scoring 4 goals for us including the charity shield but does not record any cup goals, so maybe they donât record that
Anyway in terms of punts for tiny money you have to go with Anelka, RVP, Fabregas and even Alex Song. It depends where you draw the line in cost. Even Bellerin for all the hate he gets was a freebie
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