Obertan - 1st to Fly

Gabriel Obertan has now completed his move from United to Newcastle, we first heard this move would be completed a few days ago with 3million being the figure being mentioned. But as always when Utd are involved the official fee is undisclosed.

You may remember my previous post Fight or Flight, where I spoke of the possibility of Obertan moving on or fighting for a place in the squad. It seems the arrival of Ashley Young has been the final nail in the coffin for the Frenchman. With the extra competition pushing him further down the pecking order at Old Trafford, where he was already struggling to make an impact.


Personally I will be wishing Gabby all the best with his move and feel it is a great move for both himself and Newcastle, especially if the £3million price tag is accurate. In a transfer market when Liverpool and Arsenal have paid £16-20mil and £12-15mill for Jordan Henderson and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain respectively. Henderson has had a lot more premiership experience than Obertan, getting regular football at Sunderland over the past few seasons. Having said that though I feel Gabby has as much potential as Henderson and with regular football he will become more consistent and will improve on his weaker areas such as his decision making and his final ball.

As for Arsenals move for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, I'm getting a very weird case of déjà vu, back in 2006 when they signed up a certain Mr. Walcott was signed up. It will be interesting to see how Arsenal handle this one, will they throw him in the deep end as they did with Walcott or will they give him a proper chance to develop as a player? I am not saying Walcott is not a decent player now but I feel it has taken all these years before he has started to make an impact due to how Arsene Wenger utilised the young man.

I accept the price-tag is much lower for Obertan because of the fact he is French and not English as teams look to buy young, home-grown players to ensure their squads will meet requirements in this area in the future. But this can not deter from the fact that Newcastle have had a bargain, for a player, in Obertan, who has enormous skill and potential with 2-years experience training at Manchester United.

via The Republik of Mancunia

As I have said above, I think it is a good move for both parties involved as I fear Obertan would have found it very difficult too ever break into a regular first team squad at United. He has realised this himself and instead of spending more time at Old Trafford (which must be tempting, even if it will mainly be reserves) and picking up a handful of appearances in the cup competitions, he has stepped up, and moved on to get first team football.

Good luck and Meilleurs vœux Gabby

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