Arsenal: Shkodran Mustafi “Surprise” Rather Baffling

Arsenal are looking like geniuses for nabbing Shkodran Mustafi this summer, so how is Arsene Wengers till admitting surprise?

You have to admire honesty. Even though it is something that Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger constantly gives us, it is still a bit shocking sometimes what he freely admits. Like that he is upset that he missed out on Diego Costa.

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Another rather baffling admission, and I believe this is the second time he is admitting it, is his ‘surprise’ at how well Shkodran Mustafi has caught on with the Arsenal first team. It sounds as if Wenger expected to treat him like Mohamed Elneny and slowly ween him into the club.

Which raises far too many questions. First of all, what did Wenger expect? A burgeoning young defender with nothing but raw skill? Did his scouting report show that and suddenly he is a proven defender?

Also, were you really willing to spend £35m on a defender that you didn’t expect to be ready to play in the Premier League? I find that rather unlikely given how overly cautious Le Prof can be, not only with his money in general, but with any signing. Even the smallest ‘lapse’ cane make someone “not right for this club”.

Staying with the topic of money and how you spend that much money on a guy and have his success be a surprise to you, what about Mats Hummels? You pass up spending less on a more proven defender in order to land a less proven, younger defender and you were willing to hazard the risk that you clearly think was involved?

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Similarly, what was the back up plan? So Wenger didn’t expect him to catch on so quickly, was the back-up plan to just weather it until he did or switch back to Rob Holding?

It’s all rather confusing. I keep writing off the claims that Mustafi was a panic buy, but he has all the makings, by Wenger’s own admission, of a panic buy.

I guess when you get down to it, there is no reason to ask these questions. he is doing marvelously, Arsenal is benefiting immensely from the newly forged Kostafi and just like that, we may very well have the best defense in England.

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So while all these questions keep pressing at my cranium any time Wenger mentioned his surprise, so long as the success keeps coming, the surprise can do whatever it wants.