Olivier Giroud - Another Alan Smith or "Le Chapman"?

[StuartL]

He'll be hitting the bench when we sign Jovetić.

Unless it was point blank range I wouldn't put money on it.

[augie]

Agree.

If I think back to when we had Bergkamp and Henry, a player like Giroud would be third or even fourth choice behind Wiltord.

Except in this squad Giroud is first choice.

He should be third or fourth choice in this squad.... Podolski is a much better striker than him and I would also say without a trace of a smile that Walcott and Bendtner also are.

Another case of absence making the heart grow stronger methinks - look at bendtner's scoring record at club level and you will see a guy that couldn't even score regularly for the brummies in the championship Now I am not giroud's greatest fan or anything like it but I would pick him ahead of the worlds greatest Danish striker every day of the week and twice on a sunday - some of you seem to have forgotten just how shit bendtner really is/was

[northbank123]

Agree.

If I think back to when we had Bergkamp and Henry, a player like Giroud would be third or even fourth choice behind Wiltord.

Except in this squad Giroud is first choice.

He should be third or fourth choice in this squad.... Podolski is a much better striker than him and I would also say without a trace of a smile that Walcott and Bendtner also are.

Another case of absence making the heart grow stronger methinks - look at bendtner's scoring record at club level and you will see a guy that couldn't even score regularly for the brummies in the championship Now I am not giroud's greatest fan or anything like it but I would pick him ahead of the worlds greatest Danish striker every day of the week and twice on a sunday - some of you seem to have forgotten just how shit bendtner really is/was

And conversely I'm far from Bendtner's greatest fan but I think if he started every game up front in this Arsenal team he wouldn't do any worse than Giroud. He was also wasteful and a donkey but when he wasn't inexplicably being used as an auxiliary winger he did come up with a few important goals.

[kite]

Agree.

If I think back to when we had Bergkamp and Henry, a player like Giroud would be third or even fourth choice behind Wiltord.

Except in this squad Giroud is first choice.

He should be third or fourth choice in this squad.... Podolski is a much better striker than him and I would also say without a trace of a smile that Walcott and Bendtner also are.

Another case of absence making the heart grow stronger methinks - look at bendtner's scoring record at club level and you will see a guy that couldn't even score regularly for the brummies in the championship Now I am not giroud's greatest fan or anything like it but I would pick him ahead of the worlds greatest Danish striker every day of the week and twice on a sunday - some of you seem to have forgotten just how shit bendtner really is/was

I just did what you said and looked at his scoring record.
For Arsenal he scored a goal per 180 minutes (Giroud: 182 minutes) and if we look at league and CL only he scored a goal per 198 minutes (Giroud: 201).

[Brady's left peg]

I've just copied this from my post on the Everton thread It says all I want to say about le idiot.....

Why the fuck did we sign this totally useless excuse for a striker? £13 million for a fucking donkey, a fucking donkey who keeps going missing when the pressures on. He's lazy, he rolls around on the fucking floor whenever he's fouled, he's a fucking drama queen who makes out he's disappointed when he fucking misses (not as fucking disappointed as we are), he hardly ever presses the ball he just ambles around without a care in the fucking world. And fucking finally he cannot finish I bet the *word censored* couldn't finish a cup of tea! Just to make it worse did Wenger hook him...... NO! The prick stayed on and continued his impression of a professional footballer.
For fuck sake Wenger no more second rate journeymen from the french league, spend some fucking money on a real player of top,top quality as you so eloquently fucking put it. A player who can adequately replace a player the club sold For ahem "footballing reasons"

[QuartzGooner]

I think that Giroud and Bendtner are almost impossible to separate by statistic.
But it can be asked, is Giroud £13M better than Bendtner?
So far, my answer would be a resounding no.

But as discussed above, it is Giroud's first season in the Premiership, in a formation that does not look like it gets the best out of him.

[goonersid]

I don't agree wit the comments on here about him needing time to settle in to the prem lge, I think he has adapted quickly to the physical side of the English game, the Guy is plain and simply a shit finisher with the touch of a fucking elephant.

[p206ab]

If Wenger saw Scez when he was bad and dropped him, why oh why oh why doesn't he do the same with Giroud

[littlefire]

bleu bleu bleu

[arseofacrow]

bleu bleu bleu

[northbank123]

Quartz if there's even the tiniest iota of doubt as to whether Giroud is a better player than Nicky B then he ain't anywhere near good enough, simple as.

I don't think the adaptation period argument holds as much weight when it's fundamentals like an awful touch and a complete lack of composure in front of goal that are letting him down every week - don't see why it would make any difference what league you're in when you're actually in the position to fire a shot off.

[LeftfootlegendGooner]

Agree.

If I think back to when we had Bergkamp and Henry, a player like Giroud would be third or even fourth choice behind Wiltord.

Except in this squad Giroud is first choice.

He should be third or fourth choice in this squad.... Podolski is a much better striker than him and I would also say without a trace of a smile that Walcott and Bendtner also are.

Another case of absence making the heart grow stronger methinks - look at bendtner's scoring record at club level and you will see a guy that couldn't even score regularly for the brummies in the championship Now I am not giroud's greatest fan or anything like it but I would pick him ahead of the worlds greatest Danish striker every day of the week and twice on a sunday - some of you seem to have forgotten just how shit bendtner really is/was

I just did what you said and looked at his scoring record.
For Arsenal he scored a goal per 180 minutes (Giroud: 182 minutes) and if we look at league and CL only he scored a goal per 198 minutes (Giroud: 201).

And as NB already said most of the time Bendtner was played out wide

[LeftfootlegendGooner]

I was definitely one who said judge Giroud at the end of the season but watching him last night made me a little irate, any decent strike at least has a bit of movment so whena midfielder is looking to pass forward to him he makes a run to give the option of the pass and give himself at least a yard or two from his marker thus when he receives the ball he isn't being jostled making his first touch that much harder. He doesn't.

Okay if your not going to give that movement then when the ball is played to you from the midfielder then make yourself big and make sure that defender does not get around you to win the ball before you. He doesn't.

Time and again the defender was intercepting the ball last night and time and again giroud first touch was woeful because he has no movement and defenders just jostle him, he seems very weak for a guy that does so much gym work.

As has already been said on here he has no finesse in front of goal, he just wants to smash it every time, sure that will work sometimes but a lot of his chances this season just needed a cool head and unfortunately his head must be on fire.

Maybe he would be better as part of a front two but he still gets plenty of chances with the shape we play and I can't see his goal scoring ratio getting any better as part of a two.

All in all too static, not strong enough, not quick enough, not skilful enough, not good enough for The Arsenal.

[highburyJD]

disappointed with Giroud last night, link up play no better than OK
movement very poor and yet he go three great chances (seen live only, not watched them again on telly)

1-the (brilliant) cross from Rambo he had to put away
2-Ox may have surprised him with that pass but the goalie was taken out
3-lovely touch that created some space, turned out to be pointless when his attempt to roof the finish went over

if you want to be a top 4 striker, in a game like yesterday you have to take one of those chances
on current form you'd think Torres prob would get at least one goal FFS
as you'd expect vanStaplecunt, Hernandez, Shrek, Aguero, Dzeko, Tevez, Ba or even Dafoe to take one of those chances

Giroud has been bought in as a focal point, as Chamakh was before,
Wenger had an early noughties failed "fox-in-the-box" obsession (even thought Freddy and SuperBobby scored plenty of tap-ins for us)
is the new failed obsession a big targetman number 9...?

Giroud was excellent last season but that was his first high-pressure year of starting, and it came relatively late in his career
in some ways it's not his fault, first year in the Prem he should be able to be rotated in and out on form
instead of having his first big club, in his first year abroad, reliant on him and only him up front

I've seen him play extremely well but his inconsistency could cost us
our squad is clearly light a striker or two (esp given Wenger's unwillingness to rely on Pod or play a youth player up top)
it's an almost negligent gamble - there may be a specific forward we're chasing
we 'nearly' signed Villa who is World Class and would be an awesome signing
but with our current squad I'd rather have Vela or Bendtner in there as options, two players deemed not good enough
(and most of us could see why, decent but not yet Arsenal standard)

Ridiculous situation, I'm still in shock a forward was not signing this winter
I can see how a big name can be missed,
or Wenger not wanting to harm Afobe/ Campbell/ Ansah/whoever's prospects
but we are very clearly a body short - even another pensioner on loan for the rest of the year would have made us better
and taken some of the pressure of Giroud

our forward line, the signing of that Korean, failure to reinforce this winter
looks a decision as hard to understand as our extended reliance of Almunia was

[QuartzGooner]

Agree.

If I think back to when we had Bergkamp and Henry, a player like Giroud would be third or even fourth choice behind Wiltord.

Except in this squad Giroud is first choice.

He should be third or fourth choice in this squad.... Podolski is a much better striker than him and I would also say without a trace of a smile that Walcott and Bendtner also are.

Another case of absence making the heart grow stronger methinks - look at bendtner's scoring record at club level and you will see a guy that couldn't even score regularly for the brummies in the championship Now I am not giroud's greatest fan or anything like it but I would pick him ahead of the worlds greatest Danish striker every day of the week and twice on a sunday - some of you seem to have forgotten just how shit bendtner really is/was

I just did what you said and looked at his scoring record.
For Arsenal he scored a goal per 180 minutes (Giroud: 182 minutes) and if we look at league and CL only he scored a goal per 198 minutes (Giroud: 201).

And as NB already said most of the time Bendtner was played out wide

He was sometimes played out wide at times in his final season with us, perhaps about 14 games, but before that he was up front.

Statistics do not tell the whole story so can only be considered as part of an argument, but Bendtner's figures of 22 goals in 55 games for Denmark are reasonable.