Ideye eyes an Arsenal upset

Olympiakos of Athens are in London for a Match Day 2 of this season’s UEFA Champions League tie with Arsenal in which they are massive underdogs. They come with a striker who has played in the Premier League, Nigeria’s AFCON 2013 winner and former West Brom Albion record signing, Brown Ideye. Ideye though admitting they are underdogs thinks “it is football and anything is possible. Arsenal have already lost away (at Dinamo Zagreb in Match Day 1) and we could easily have had a draw with Bayern Munich”.

Ideye endured an unhappy time in the Midlands of England with the Albion but he does not see this match as a time to prove people wrong “I have no interest or plan to use this match to show anybody that I should still be in the EPL. I am only interested in giving my all in the match so that we leave the Emirates with at least a point. I want to be smiling when I am on that plane back to Athens and only the minimum of a point at the Emirates will guarantee that feeling”.

The Nigerian international seems to have found a home now and a manager who believes in him. “Before I signed the manager spoke with me and told me what he would like to do with me and how he would like me to play if I joined the club. What I love to do best is to play football and so this opportunity was good enough for me and I am also playing the Champions League”. Not for Ideye sitting on the bench for a Premier League side and collecting your salary then? “No. I just want to play football. People know me from watching me play so how can I start to justify being content with not playing?” he asks rhetorically.

The complexities of a football career and lines falling in different places have probably played their parts in Ideye being in Greece now instead of still being in the Premier League. Perhaps the price tag weighed him down? “You don’t ever remember the transfer fee when you are on the pitch” he says with a dismissive laugh at the suggestion. “The biggest problem was that I joined the team after their pre-season and so was not able to get into the rhythm of the league early. And then I got injured, by the time I was fit the manager had been sacked”. That’s Alan Irvine.

Tony Pulis replaced Irvine and went about doing things his own and it seemed that Ideye was not part of his plans even though the striker started scoring goals. “Tony Pulis was a very good manager and a kind man to me. Was always encouraging me but he also had his plans and how he wanted to play. At the start of this season and after a good pre-season in which I scored a few goals I was ready but I realised he had different ideas and I was not ready to sit on the bench”.

Brown ideye is one of those strikers happy to lead the line and get others into play. The type of striker who provides a lot of assists “I believe that football is a team game and the most important thing is to win so personally I am ready to give an assist to a team mate in a better position rather than attempt to score myself”. In his five league games at Olympiakos he has 3 assists and no goals yet. “I am slightly worried that I have not scored but my manager tells me not to worry because I am playing according to the team tactics but I hope to score sooner rather than later”.

An ideye goal at the Emirates in the Champions League against Arsenal will delight not just him but his manager and the expected vociferous visiting fans of Olympiakos.