Jordan Ayew - sold to Swansea

[Dante Lavelli]

We do pretty much have a Director of Football, that chap from Arsenal.

Hopefully - and being an optimist - this chap has been sat at arsenal for the last few years accumulating knowledge/players which would have been perfect for us but not yet Arsenal quality.  Therefore like when Wenger moved to Arsenal from Japan he had a list of players he knew he needed to sign.  Petit, Viera and Anelka were largely unknown when signed but provided the catalyst for their growth.  We also have Reilly and any scouting database he bought from Liverpool.

I'm not saying any of the opinions are wrong, but the negative outcome is not the only option, positive could also happen if the new people have done their jobs properly.

[Dante Lavelli]

Anyone know what Swansea paid to buy Ayew's big brother?

[ethicalvillain]

Swansea got him on a free, but rumours down here that they gave him a £6m signing fee.

[Matt Collins]

Quite a lot of people I've listened to are really querying whether this guy will cut the mustard - bit small, but surly, etc

Overall there must be risks to the mentality of the group. V few experienced heads left. Risks of a French speaking clique.

Pleased with most of our transfer activity but we still look weak in some areas and there's an awful lot of question marks about us still

[onje_villa]

Quite a lot of people I've listened to are really querying whether this guy will cut the mustard - bit small, but surly, etc

Overall there must be risks to the mentality of the group. V few experienced heads left. Risks of a French speaking clique.

Pleased with most of our transfer activity but we still look weak in some areas and there's an awful lot of question marks about us still

Funny, my French pal who follows Ligue 1 a lot said all our signings were good young players. He was concerned about what happened with Newcastle but he singled out Ayew as the one who could be very "dangerous" if he was pointed in the right direction and kept on track.

Whether or not that's because he's a striker and he doesn't know as much about the others I'm not sure but yes he's certainly seen as someone who can be very headstrong but has real dangerous ability.

[Matt Collins]

It's a bit like the eredivisie. Weak league with lots of good players sprinkled here and there. Makes it hard to tell how good they really are

What do I know?  But my guess is gueye hits the ground running. Amavi does well but costs us a few goals to begin with. Veretout is possibly the most promising but may take longer than gueye to adapt. Ayew the wild card.

But I'm guessing a lot there

[onje_villa]

It's a bit like the eredivisie. Weak league with lots of good players sprinkled here and there. Makes it hard to tell how good they really are

What do I know?  But my guess is gueye hits the ground running. Amavi does well but costs us a few goals to begin with. Veretout is possibly the most promising but may take longer than gueye to adapt. Ayew the wild card.

But I'm guessing a lot there

That's my gut feeling too. I think Gueye looks the one most likely to hit the ground running, really looks like a cracking player for the league. A sort of Chelsea midfielder if that makes sense.

[paul_e]

It's a bit like the eredivisie. Weak league with lots of good players sprinkled here and there. Makes it hard to tell how good they really are

What do I know?  But my guess is gueye hits the ground running. Amavi does well but costs us a few goals to begin with. Veretout is possibly the most promising but may take longer than gueye to adapt. Ayew the wild card.

But I'm guessing a lot there

That's my gut feeling too. I think Gueye looks the one most likely to hit the ground running, really looks like a cracking player for the league. A sort of Chelsea midfielder if that makes sense.

I agree on Ayew, I think Veretout will be superb though, he's got that direct, energetic style that has worked for people like Scholes and Hazard in this league, because it's quite late in the window he might need a month or 2 but I think by October he'll be a bit of a talisman for us, he's the sort of player I've wanted us to sign for ages but my knowledge of French football isn't good enough to have known who he was.  All this is based on opinions of french people and youtube videos though so I might be sticking my neck out a touch, especially given he hasn't actually signed yet (I suspect we'll see some shirt stretching this afternoon though, maybe 2-3 players at once).

[Ron Manager]

It's a bit like the eredivisie. Weak league with lots of good players sprinkled here and there. Makes it hard to tell how good they really are

What do I know?  But my guess is gueye hits the ground running. Amavi does well but costs us a few goals to begin with. Veretout is possibly the most promising but may take longer than gueye to adapt. Ayew the wild card.

But I'm guessing a lot there

That's my gut feeling too. I think Gueye looks the one most likely to hit the ground running, really looks like a cracking player for the league. A sort of Chelsea midfielder if that makes sense.

Ramires is the Chelsea player you have in mind. I like him.

[onje_villa]

It's a bit like the eredivisie. Weak league with lots of good players sprinkled here and there. Makes it hard to tell how good they really are

What do I know?  But my guess is gueye hits the ground running. Amavi does well but costs us a few goals to begin with. Veretout is possibly the most promising but may take longer than gueye to adapt. Ayew the wild card.

But I'm guessing a lot there

That's my gut feeling too. I think Gueye looks the one most likely to hit the ground running, really looks like a cracking player for the league. A sort of Chelsea midfielder if that makes sense.

Ramires is the Chelsea player you have in mind. I like him.

Yep a lot like Ramires but it's the sort of high energy, tidy-on-the-ball midfielders that they seem to like.

[onje_villa]

It's a bit like the eredivisie. Weak league with lots of good players sprinkled here and there. Makes it hard to tell how good they really are

What do I know?  But my guess is gueye hits the ground running. Amavi does well but costs us a few goals to begin with. Veretout is possibly the most promising but may take longer than gueye to adapt. Ayew the wild card.

But I'm guessing a lot there

That's my gut feeling too. I think Gueye looks the one most likely to hit the ground running, really looks like a cracking player for the league. A sort of Chelsea midfielder if that makes sense.

I agree on Ayew, I think Veretout will be superb though, he's got that direct, energetic style that has worked for people like Scholes and Hazard in this league, because it's quite late in the window he might need a month or 2 but I think by October he'll be a bit of a talisman for us, he's the sort of player I've wanted us to sign for ages but my knowledge of French football isn't good enough to have known who he was.  All this is based on opinions of french people and youtube videos though so I might be sticking my neck out a touch, especially given he hasn't actually signed yet (I suspect we'll see some shirt stretching this afternoon though, maybe 2-3 players at once).

Am definitely excited about the prospect of Veretout as you say everyone seems to be raving about him. Hard to say from YouTube as it mainly shows penalties and the odd normal looking goal but he seems to drive forward with great energy.

[Villa in Denmark]

It's a bit like the eredivisie. Weak league with lots of good players sprinkled here and there. Makes it hard to tell how good they really are

What do I know?  But my guess is gueye hits the ground running. Amavi does well but costs us a few goals to begin with. Veretout is possibly the most promising but may take longer than gueye to adapt. Ayew the wild card.

But I'm guessing a lot there

That's my gut feeling too. I think Gueye looks the one most likely to hit the ground running, really looks like a cracking player for the league. A sort of Chelsea midfielder if that makes sense.

Ramires is the Chelsea player you have in mind. I like him.

Yep a lot like Ramires but it's the sort of high energy, tidy-on-the-ball midfielders that they seem to like.

Hopefully not as a big a dirty cheating ****** as Ramires.

[Steve67]

Great.

[peter w]

Ayew could be a Vasell. But maybe also a Lamptey.

[A Northern Soul]

Interesting read (the latter part) from The Guardian today

Ghana, after their hugely impressive Cup of Nations and then World Cup in 2010, were many people’s favourites to win the tournament in Equatorial Guinea and Gabon in 2012, but they’d been restrained in the group stage, albeit qualifying with seven points. In the quarter-final in Franceville, they faced Tunisia. Ghana again disappointed, except for one player.

André Ayew was 22 at the time and had spent most of his career cursed by comparisons with his father, the great Abedi Pele. “What my father achieved in Ghana is huge,” he said. “He brought a lot to the country. I’m very proud of what he has done, but this doesn’t have any bearing on my game. Sometimes people may make useless comparisons. I suppose it’s normal, but I had to learn to live with that.” This was the day when he made the comparisons secondary, the day when he became a star in his own right.

John Mensah had headed Ghana into an early lead and Saber Kelifa had nodded an equaliser just before half-time. From then on, it was all about Ayew, surging forward, inspired by a sense of will and purpose his team-mates couldn’t match. Tunisia, never a side shy about the physical side of the game, kicked lumps out of him, again and again, but Ayew was implacable. Every time he was kicked he came back for more. His drive was relentless. The final minutes of normal time consisted almost entirely of him charging at the Tunisia backline, the ball being cleared and him going again. His reward came in extra time as the Tunisia goalkeeper Aymen Mathlouthi dropped a cross and he knocked the bouncing ball into an empty net; it was an ugly goal, but it was a gift Ayew thoroughly deserved.

In the semi-final, Ghana were lethargic and lost 1-0 to Zambia. That really has been the story of Ayew’s career throughout: moments of incandescence followed by patches of ordinariness. His talent has been evident for years. He is quick and direct, a threat in the air arriving late in the box and it seems he has begun to take on a leadership role. For Swansea to pick him up on a free transfer, even with a reported signing-on fee of £5.7m, is a remarkable coup, a sign both of the Premier League’s increasing financial domination of Europe and of Swansea’s growing reputation.

“He is not going to be a one-player saviour for the team or anything like that,” Garry Monk said after Ayew had scored a fine goal in the pre-season friendly against Nottingham Forest. “He is a team player and everyone has to be contribute. I do think he will bring quality and he has experience as well – I already hear him talking to the group within games and within training sessions. He brings that. But it’s not for him to go and score all the goals and create all the chances – everyone has to do that.”

That’s all sensible and true, but the exciting thing about Ayew is that he is capable of being a one-man saviour but has learned that most of the time he shouldn’t try to be; if he can find consistency he will be brilliant. He should fit in perfectly in Swansea – and not just because his second name is Morgan.

His younger brother, Jordan, who has just joined Aston Villa for £12m, is rather different. He plays higher up the pitch than André, and the fact he scored 12 goals and registered five assists for Lorient last season indicates he has talent. But he is a hugely frustrating player.

Filippo Inzaghi might have been born offside, but Jordan Ayew seems to have made it a favourite holiday destination and visits frequently (stats from whoscored.com show he goes 0.7 times a game, but it feels like more). At least with Inzaghi it could be argued that he was offside a lot because he lived always on the edge, forever trying to steal a couple of feet on a defender, pushing the line; with Ayew it often just seems like doziness.

That adds to a general sense that he lacks the game intelligence of his brother. Football is full of counter-factuals, but what if, with Ghana 2-1 up against Germany and playing superbly during the World Cup, Jordan Ayew had squared to leave Asamoah Gyan with a relatively simple finish, rather than vainly – in both senses of the word – attempting a shot? Miroslav Klose wouldn’t have come on to score an equaliser, Germany might not have rediscovered their shape and they might not be world champions.

Jordan Ayew chooses the wrong option a lot, which is one of the reasons his pass completion rate is under 80% despite him attempting only 0.6 long balls and 0.2 crosses per game last season. There was a match at this year’s Cup of Nations when yet another turn down a blind alley led to a great collective groan from the press box, not just from the Ghanaians but from everybody, aggrieved that another piece of coherent play had withered. Ayew was dispossessed 4.0 times per game last season, more often than anybody else in Ligue Un, while losing possession with bad first touches 3.8 times per game, 27 per cent more than anybody else in the league.

“He is a good player and he will do good things and it will be exciting for sure if we get to play against each other,” André said of his brother (Swansea face Villa on 24 October), which is all very proper and fraternal of him.

Realistically, though, there is a gulf between the pair.

Jordan plays as though he is far more than two years younger and unless he matures rapidly there’s a real possibility he’ll become one of those players who aggravate their own fans far more than they excite them.

André, though, could yet be very special indeed: what he did in Franceville against Tunisia spoke of an exceptional talent.