Tony Pulis has fired back at fans who constantly call him out for writing off Serge Gnabry when the attacker played on loan for his West Brom side.
Gnabry started his professional career at Arsenal but struggled to play regularly for their first team and went on a short loan spell to West Brom.
Pulis managed the Midlands club at the time, but Gnabry was also struggling to get game time there.
The English coach insisted he was not playing many matches because he simply wasn’t good enough. Gnabry eventually left Arsenal and is now one of the best attackers in the world.
Pulis’ assessment is still considered one of the worst errors of judgements to this day, but he has responded.
‘I always get this thrown at me, but what people forget is that we had [Gnabry] on loan, Arsenal were his mother club, and Arsene Wenger was his manager and he sold him to Werder Bremen for £7million,’ he told Under The Cosh Podcast.
‘He had him right from 14 all the way through, I only had him for a couple of months.
‘He has done fantastically well now, you have to hold your hands up, but at the time he was nowhere near it. He was brought off in a reserve game.
‘I wasn’t there but they played Aston Villa on a Monday night and the reserve coach, who is at Sheffield Wednesday with Darren [Moore] now, brought him off.
‘He said he never tried a leg, he stood out wide, he flicked it up a few times and that was it. He has gone on to great things and done fantastically well.’
Just Arsenal Opinion
Even Gnabry would be surprised at how his career progressed when he moved back to Germany and it could be that he simply did not suit English football.
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RATHER A LONG TIME AGO NOW TO BE OF MUCH INTEREST, I RECKON.
Agree – we’ll be talking about letting Kane go next.
Dont forget Andy Cole.
Didn’t AW want to keep him?
Interesting to see Pulis’s side of it – if Gnabry was as poor as he says back then, then he was right not to play him.
Sometimes it’s not about “English football”, it’s about the dynamic of a squad. That’s why John Terry as Chelsea captain got his players together for social gaming nights at his house to help them integrate and become a team.
Who knows what the dynamic was when Gnabry was with Pulis, but it shows why MA/Edu are keen on squad harmony.
Terry got his player together for social gaming nights then made excuses to go somewhere else. (as the players wives were alone)
I remember him looking fantastic against Swansea away. Although it was only one game, you could see there was something there.
But Wenger loved Walcott, and bizarrely, Ramsey on the right wing. So that was the end of that!
I remember that game as well. He scored the winner in a tight game, I believe.
I think gnabry was unlucky with injuries more than anything. I do think AW wanted to bring him through and we sold him reluctantly (though why the fee was so low, I can’t explain given he’d just shown his class to the world at the Olympics).
The one who I thought was unfairly treated was Carlos Vela – one of the few players I always thought had an “elite” level first touch, plus he had pace, skill and finishing ability. He’s the one I thought was unfairly left out because of favouritism towards Walcott, but there may have been more to it you can’t see from the outside.
Dude was out of shape, had zero engine at the time. I remember Rosicky propping him up to help him finish a match…Once Bayern whispered in his ear, he upped his game and put himself in the shop window. Hence why he refused to renew his contract.
Tony Pulis? Oh yes I can just about remembe him and what all his thuggish teams stood for. Unfortunately. Wish I could forget!