According to reports from London Evening Standard, Arsenal’s club-record signing Mesut Ozil is a ‘serious’ target for Turkish outfit Fenerbahce.
What’s the word?
Mesut Ozil’s agent, a Dr Erkut Sogut, has made the rather outrageous claim that the Gunners’ £42.2million man could be heading off to the Turkish top flight with Fenerbahce at the end of the season.
He told Turkish news outlet Tavkim; “At Arsenal, Mesut is very successful in his performances. It’s too early to talk right now. But you cannot know the conditions. Fenerbahce seem serious about Mesut. It is difficult to predict in advance how Arsenal would respond. At the end of the season, we’ll see. However, leaving Arsenal for Fenerbahce could be a serious choice for him. They are one of Turkey’s biggest clubs.”
Would Arsenal really sell him?
Worth £42.4million? Mesut Ozil’s league form since signing for Arsenal in summer 2013
Perhaps. In theory, Ozil is meant to be Arsenal’s best player. In practice, however, he’s yet to truly deliver on his club-record price-tag.
The German international’s world-class talent is evident on occasion and he currently boasts the most created chances per-match in the Premier League – a whopping five – but when Arsenal have needed him most, the World Cup winner seems to be either sidelined through injury or completely anonymous on the pitch.
Wednesday night’s defeat to Dynamo Zagreb was a prime example; one shot, one successful dribble and one created chance from 90 minutes, against a side who previously hadn’t won in the Champions League since 1999.
Excepting a Man of the Match display against Napoli a few months after moving to the Emirates in summer 2013, the 26 year-old is yet to prove the deciding factor in a major game for Arsenal, in the manner you’d expect a club-record signing to. Now into his third season with the Gunners, Arsene Wenger might be starting to think about getting some of his money back.
Wouldn’t Fenerbahce be a major step down?
Turkish football is certainly on the up, for a few important reasons.
Firstly, the Wall Street Journal revealed a significant jump in consumer spending across Turkey for the first quarter of 2015, so with nearly half of their 80million population aged between 25 and 54, a significant chunk is being spent on football. Likewise, the Turkish top flight’s television revenues have increased 16-fold in the last 20 years and they’re now the sixth-most lucrative league in the world according to co-founder of Turkish-Football.com Emre Sarigul- as reported by IBT.
Notable foreign stars to have joined the Super Lig since summer 2012
But perhaps the biggest recent advancement is the relaxing of home-grown quotas. In January, it was announced that Turkish sides are now allowed up to 14 foreign players in their squads. Fenerbahce took advantage of that ruling during the summer, securing deals for former Manchester United stars Robin van Persie and Nani as well as Liverpool’s Lazar Markovic on a season-long loan, but Galatasaray have been attracting equally star-studded names for some time. There appears to be a model developing of big wage bills and low transfer fees, which allows Turkey’s top clubs to sign world-renowned talents previously assumed beyond their reach.
That being said, those who end up in the Turkish top flight tend to be past their peak or for whatever reason, out of favour at their current clubs. Ozil is neither; he started all seven fixtures in Germany’s World Cup-winning campaign just twelve months ago and despite constant criticism over his form, is always selected by Wenger when fit.
Likewise, only the winners of the Super Lig qualify for the Champions League proper – a competition the Arsenal midfielder will expect to play in every year.
So is there any truth to it?
Well the quotes are clearly genuine, the London Evening Standard is a decent quality paper and I’m sure Fenerbahce would love to sign a player as talented and commercially profitable as Mesut Ozil – he earns around £3.8million per-year in endorsements alone and would generate plenty more interest in the Turkish top flight. The attacking midfielder is also of Turkish heritage, which is another interesting factor.
But how Fenerbahce could realistically afford a player Arsenal spent £42.4million on just two summers ago and why he would want to make such an audacious move at the relatively young age of 26 remain the biggest mysteries. Their summer spending totaled at £30million – so are the Istanbul outfit really about to spend a similar amount on just one player, before his wages even come into the equation? You’d also expect a spate of clubs across Europe – not least including German giants Bayern Munich – to try and get involved if Arsenal look to sell.
Next summer, Ozil will have two terms remaining on the five-year deal he signed in 2013. You get the feeling his agent is attempting to drum up speculation, hoping it might accelerate talks over a new contract – which of course means the Gunners will have to shell out a signing on bonus and other various agent fees.
But the reason virtually every newspaper have printed their own interpretation of Dr Erkut Sogut’s comments is because there’s a common feeling that Arsenal might decide to cut their losses on Ozil instead of issuing him a new contract. Should that be the case, however, Fenerbahce will be some way down on the German international’s list of preferred destinations.
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