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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Fight or Flight

Every season, is a big season, for every Man Utd player. At the top you always have to perform at your personal personal best or you will fall down the pecking order at the club. Barring Rooney who seemed to be allowed the opportunity to play through his slump (and gain forgiveness) in the first half of last season....but he is Wayne Rooney after all. There are a few players though which when brought in carry high hopes but ultimately fail to deliver, e.g. Kleberson, Tosic, Manucho and he who shall not be named (Eric Djemba-Djemba). The list can go on, maybe some of them never received the same opportunity as others but regardless, there are a few players at the club atm who could are in danger of falling into this list. This season coming (if they aren't sold before then) will be a big one for Darron Gibson, Gabriel Obertan and Mame Biram Diouf. It will challenge them with the choice we all face in tough situations; Fight or Flight!?

Darron Gibson

In Darron we have a player who has all the attributes to be our commander in midfield and at times he has shown this ability but unfortunately he hasn't always been able to consistently make the grade. Already been entangled in a transfer situation this summer, turning down a move to Sunderland, apparently because they messed him about a bit with contract negotiations. Darron has had a meeting with Sir Alex and they decided he should stay home from the USA tour to make a decision on his future. He is not being forced out though and it seems SAF has left it in Gibsons own hands, if he decides to stay and gives it one last go at United (and I hope he does) he may gain an attitude in which he gives 100% for every minute on the pitch, and if this happens, he could become very successful.


Gabriel Obertan

Gabriel has been limited to mainly substitute appearances in his time at Old Trafford as far as the first team goes. He seems to be a force to be wreckoned with in the reserves scoring 9 goals in 19appearences, but he cannot perform at this level when he is brought up to 1st team level. He can be very frustrating to watch at times because he gets so close but then takes a heavy touch and loses the ball, runs into trouble when he had a simple pass earlier in the play or beats 2 defenders and then fails to deliver a decent cross. Seems to be he does all the hard work but never quite gets the end result. If he can begin to find this final ball right he could have an impact and join Nani, Young and Valencia as one of our top-class wingers.

Mame Biram Diouf 


Diouf faces the toughest challenge of the three players I have mentioned so far, he has had very limited first team appearances, which is unfortunate. He was on loan last year with Backburn so gained valuable 1st team premier league experience, although he only scored 6 goals in 26 appearances so he did not light the goalscoring charts alight. Maybe this is harsh though because it is nearly 1 goal in 4 apps, at a team who where struggling at the wrong end of the table all season, maybe at Man Utd where more chances will be created and more freedom afforded to their strikers he would have much more success. I was actually very impressed with the goal he scored in the recent friendly against the Seattle Sounders, he showed great space and movement to recieve the pass, the composure to steady himself and ensure the ball found the back of the net. The reason I a fear his task is the toughest is because of the sheer competition he faces from other strikers in the club. Behind the first choice strikers of Rooney, Berbatov, Hernandez and even Owen he will have to compete with Danny Welbeck and Frderico Macheda. This will make it tough to even get a start in the League cup. This competition is most likely why Blackpool have taken an interest in buying Diouf in recent weeks.

I'd like to point out at this stage that I hate 'fans' who just shit on the fringe players, that they are not good enough and never give them a chance. I always try to be realistic and of course accept that not everyone will make it as a 1st team regular at the Theatre of Dreams but I will always try to give the benefit of the doubt and try to defend any Man Utd players. 

It's also going to be a big season for Welbeck, Cleverly, Macheda but I have a feeling these three, returning from loans, will be given a little more slack before they looked at to be sold on. Especially because United have invested so much time and effort into their development over the years.

P.S. Rooney eventually did gain forgiveness from the fans...

P.p.s. I was there, just behind the goal and had just finished slagging Wayne off before he done this.

...and he has set his targets high this season for himself,

"Messi is a great player and rightly World Player of the Year. I think, not just for me, but for every footballer out there, that's the target you want to try to get to and hopefully I can do that." - Wayne Rooney uses Messi as a target to reach for

So hopefully we will see the return of Wayne from 09/10 and with no scandals or contact issues this season there is no reason why we shouldn't.

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