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Wenger admits he made a huge mistake; Didier Drogba
Topic Started: Apr 17 2009, 07:05 PM (106 Views)
Homer
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I am the King
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I missed out on £100k Drogba: Arsenal boss Wenger's regret at failure to snap up a bargain

Arsene Wenger has confessed to perhaps the most costly transfer mistake of his Arsenal career, when he rejected the chance to sign Didier Drogba for £100,000.

At the time, Drogba was playing for French side Le Mans and though Wenger's scouts were regular visitors, he decided not to buy.

By the time Chelsea signed the Ivory Coast striker from Marseille in 2004, the price had shot up to £24million. These days, £100,000 would not even cover his weekly wage.

'We watched him carefully when he was at Le Mans,' said Wenger. 'It was not only us who watched him. But we felt he might not be completely ready.
'It was a mistake but, when you are in football, everyone can understand. We had Thierry Henry. We said we would follow Drogba's progress. We never ruled him out.'
Drogba left Le Mans and moved to Guingamp for £80,000 and thence to Marseille for £3.3m in 2003.

'He wanted to stay in France,' said Wenger. 'Marseille were the club of his dreams, I think they still are. But when he was in Marseille, Chelsea came in.'

Since arriving at Chelsea, Drogba has made Wenger pay for his hesitation, scoring seven in eight games against the Gunners, including two in the 2007 Carling Cup final.

He was one of the driving forces behind the success story at Stamford Bridge under Jose Mourinho but has not always been easy to manage.

Having sulked his way through the first seven months of the season, Drogba has exploded into life since Guus Hiddink replaced Luiz Felipe Scolari as manager in February and he will relish another shot at destroying Arsenal's depleted defence in Saturday's FA Cup semi-final at Wembley.

Hiddink is Chelsea's seventh manager during Wenger's 13-year reign at Arsenal and the eighth is expected to be appointed in the summer.
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KOL
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Big Daddy Welbz
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We've just missed out on so many of the world's best players. We tried to sign Ronaldinho for around £2million when he was in Brazil, but the stupid work-permit rule stopped us from getting him. Messi nearly came to us at the same time as Fabregas but he pulled out in the last minute. C.Ronaldo nearly joined us as well
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GunnerBoy
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Prediction & Scorers Double 13/14
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until united offerd more with ronaldo :(
"3-0, easy win. I'll quit the forum if we lose, we're not Arsenal mate we sort our business." Ant on the FA Cup final 15/4/2013
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Vardy’s Mum
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It's all water under the bridge. While we've missed out on some we've got our hands on some too.
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Scholes
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Nothing's as it seems
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There's no saying how big of a hit Drogba would've become at Arsenal though. It may not hav been the right move.
Scholes
 

Seriously, Frank Lampard is an absolute legend of the game. He needs to be recognised in some way eg. Frank Lampard OBE, Sir Frank Lampard or some kind of lifetime achievement award.

AntMcfc
 
Greatest ownage machine: Scholes. Absolute animal when he was a regular poster, I always knew I was in the right when he was backing me up, and I couldn't wait to read a topic that he was posting in because I knew he'd be tearing someone apart
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Homer
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Ahead of the Gunners' crunch FA Cup semi-final against Chelsea at Wembley on Saturday, Wenger was quoted in The Times as saying, “We all have a dark side.

“You cannot be in this job and not become angry. I get angry every day, but you learn to control it.”
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