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This article is part of Football FanCast’s Opinion series, which provides analysis, insight and opinion on any issue within the beautiful game, from Paul Pogba’s haircuts to League Two relegation battles…
If you were an Arsenal fan and you didn’t know who Takuma Asano was, then you would be forgiven. The 24-year-old has been on the club’s books since the summer of 2016, but has failed to register a single competitive appearance for the Gunners.
At the time of his signing, Arsene Wenger proudly declared that Asano was a “talented young striker and very much one for the future”. Perhaps even the iconic French manager could not have envisaged a scenario whereby three years later, the Japanese ace would still not have taken to the field at the Emirates.
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As is unfortunately the case when it comes to signing players from Asian outfits, the pre-conception is that clubs do it to boost their marketing profile. The likes of Park Ji-Sung and Son Heung-Min have done well to dispel that notion somewhat in recent history, but Asano’s failings leave another black mark on clubs opting to sign talent from Asia.
The 24-year-old has spent the past three campaigns on loan at German sides VfB Stuttgart and Hannover 96, and his time with the latter last season ended in quite farcical fashion.
Having managed 13 league appearances by April – without scoring a single goal – Asano was one appearance away from forcing Hannover to pay £2.6m to make the loan deal permanent. The result? Asano was frozen out from the team for the rest of the campaign so that the German club could avoid taking the Japan international off Arsenal’s hands.
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Now, reports claim that Partizan Belgrade are close to taking the striker to Serbia for the upcoming season and that they will have an option to sign him permanently after that. Bizarrely though, the 24-year-old’s contract with the Gunners will have expired by then and he could thus leave on a free transfer.
Asano’s signing will go down as one of the most forgettable in the club’s recent history, and serves as a reminder that not all promising stars turn out for the best. Sorry Arsene.
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