Arsenal sign Eduardo da Silva to replace Henry
Posted by Arsenalist on July 2, 2007
Owen, Tevez, Babel, Anelka, Pederson, Eto’o, Silva. Who? Silva, Eduardo da Silva. Probably the last person expected to sign with Arsenal did so on Monday. The 24 year old Brazilian born Croatian of the Dinamo Zagreb fame might have cost us £16 million pounds (but that’s unlikely), that number does sound eerily familiar, doesn’t it? No newspaper or internet site had a damn clue this was going to happen, Arsene Wenger is one sneaky, sneaky Frenchman for keeping this a secret until it actually happened. It’s a four year deal which will keep him at The Emirates Stadium until the end of the 2010-11 campaign.
The left-footed Silva has been the leading scorer in the Croatian domestic league for two straight seasons (34 in the last) and looks like he’s become too good to play in Croatia. He’s a Croatian hero of sorts and fans will miss him. He’s already holds an Arsenal first, the first competitive goal to be scored at the Emirates stadium which happened in the Champions League qualifier last season. The fee is a record for a player leaving Dinamo Zagreb, their coach, Branko Ivankovic, doesn’t confirm or deny the record deal but obviously values the player:
I cannot confirm that the transfer cost £16.25 million because that is a business secret and, in the end, I am a coach and I am not interested in the finance. I can only say that this is the biggest transfer in Dinamo’s history because, if it were smaller, we would not be doing the deal.
Raise your hand if you’ve seen him play more than one game? Nobody? That about sums up the knowledge supporters have about the youngster but one thing is for certain, he’s too good for the Croatian league and is highly thought of by his ex-manager and Wenger. Many will be like WTF on hearing his name but Arsene Wenger’s been obviously keeping close tabs on him over the years and monitoring his progress, otherwise the huge fee wouldn’t make any sense.
According to Soccernet this looks to be the only striker signing for us this summer and AW will now look to strengthen a defense that allowed its fair share of bad goals and was below average in defending set pieces (memory just recalled the Alex goal).
I highly doubt we actually paid £16 million for him, somewhere around half that is the rumour. So much for the Anelka return and Tevez interest. The one thing you can’t accuse of Arsene Wenger of being is cheap, for that fee and a little more we could’ve got any of the players that were being talked about but Wenger knew what he wanted from the start and got his man.
Here’s some video of our new signing, remind you of anyone? Thanks for reading.
Da Silva videos
Da Silva Goal vs Arsenal in Champions League
July 2, 2007 at 3:30 pm
Nice post. Wonder what this does to the potential Babel move next year? My guess is its not going to happen since this is a long term commitment.
July 2, 2007 at 3:38 pm
Wasnt £16mil more like 6 to 8 mil i believe. Anyway he looks like a real poacher. Has a good bit of pace and strength and while not looking all that tall he seems to get a fair number of goals with his head. I remember seeing the one he got against Italy for Croatia recently, stuck it away with his head from a deep cross. Lets hope he settles quickly and becomes an instant hit. Dudu9 - Eduardo9 ?
July 2, 2007 at 4:06 pm
RVP and him are both left footed. I don’t get it.
July 2, 2007 at 8:26 pm
Soccernet is fucking stupid for even suggesting a £16 million fee. The FIFA report is much more reasonable.
July 4, 2007 at 9:45 am
Woot
i hope he and RVP can form a good partnership
July 4, 2007 at 10:15 am
The only thing is that they both favour their left foot so I’m guessing that a partnership with Adebayor would be more common.
July 4, 2007 at 10:51 pm
yea btw Theo Walcott is oso left footed
July 5, 2007 at 3:59 pm
i believe da silva will fill henry’s vacuum, afterall Henry was relatively unknown when he signed for the gunners
July 6, 2007 at 11:45 am
arsenal fans dont worry ………………..hes the best player for arsenal…..our league is not good and nice blabla like yours..but sorry if he can play with players who are on the field just to break legs he can play with mfc pussies (ronaldo)& chelsea pussies ……..i dont get it he scored italy israel england arsenal auxerre ………cmon people and is he a good player? .,…he is always on right place and in right time …yeah he scored 20 goals from 5 or 10m….and i read some ars.fan said that he isnt good and fuck his34goals …just to ask :attackers in premiership are scoring only from 20m …?????? fucking stupid boy ….and just to inform you he was injured for 1 month =34goals …hmmm 54 goals in one year …..is any better and totti topscorer with 18 goals funny…..platini”s job ……who is that boy da silva ????? abramovic and glazer will cry and he will scoring every match hehe bad blue boys always with you dudu