{"id":830153,"date":"2025-02-27T10:13:02","date_gmt":"2025-02-27T16:13:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/02\/27\/i-nearly-joined-iwobi-reveals-tiny-margins-that-made-him-stay-at-arsenal-instead-of-moving-to-scotland\/"},"modified":"2025-02-27T10:13:02","modified_gmt":"2025-02-27T16:13:02","slug":"i-nearly-joined-iwobi-reveals-tiny-margins-that-made-him-stay-at-arsenal-instead-of-moving-to-scotland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/02\/27\/i-nearly-joined-iwobi-reveals-tiny-margins-that-made-him-stay-at-arsenal-instead-of-moving-to-scotland\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cI nearly joined\u201d \u2013 Iwobi reveals tiny margins that made him stay at Arsenal instead of moving to Scotland\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

Soccer <\/p>\n

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Super Eagles and Fulham midfielder, Alex Chuka Iwobi, has revealed he nearly joined SPFL side, Celtic, before making his debut for Arsenal, Soccernet.ng<\/a> reports.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The 28-year-old versatile midfielder joined the famous Arsenal Hale End academy in 2004 at the tender age of eight, but he nearly got released when he was 14, and then again when he was 16.<\/p>\n

Eventually, Iwobi<\/a><\/strong> made his debut for the Gunners senior team in 2015, and went on to win The Emirates FA Cup with Arsenal. He\u2019s played for Everton and Fulham since then, but the journey could have taken another route, but for his and his family\u2019s resilience.<\/p>\n

Alex Iwobi breaks with the ball during the match between Chelsea vs Fulham at Stamford Bridge, London, United Kingdom, 26th December 2024. [Photo Credit\/ Imago].<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Get Our Sports News First \u2013\u00a0Join Our WhatsApp Channel Now!<\/a><\/strong><\/h3>\n
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\u201cWhen you actually have to leave school and it\u2019s full time football, that\u2019s when I thought \u2018okay, it\u2019s getting serious now that I need to buckle up\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt 16, I got told I had the option to leave Arsenal or go to another club or sign a scholar. So I was like, what do I do here?, because I mean, I couldn\u2019t make, I just think of the decisions I made when I was 16 and none of them were sensible. You didn\u2019t have an option to sign for Arsenal, I\u2019m afraid.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone has different paths, but I\u2019ve always had a great support system. Like my dad and my\u00a0mum<\/span> and my sister have always been around to say that,\u201d the former Everton said on the Fulham Fix Podcast<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

24 August 2024, United Kingdom, London: Alex Iwobi celebrates scoring his side\u2019s second goal during the match between Fulham and Leicester City at Craven Cottage. [Photo Credit\/ X].<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Iwobi<\/a> added that he had offers from Crystal Palace and Celtic when he was 16, but his dream of playing for Arsenal lingered, and in the end, he chose to fight for his place.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhen I was younger, there\u2019s many times I\u2019ve been told, oh, you\u2019re not good enough, you\u2019re not good enough, and that was just another moment. I was the only one playing for England at the time that didn\u2019t get offered a professional contract where there was like six of them.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo I only just had a scholar and they said, \u2018oh, if you want to go, you can go\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo I was meant to go to\u00a0Celtic<\/span>. I went to see\u00a0Crystal Palace<\/span>. I know there was one more team I can\u2019t remember, but I remember going to\u00a0Crystal Palace<\/span>\u00a0and\u00a0training<\/span>\u00a0ground at 16.<\/p>\n

\u201cMe and my dad said \u2018no, you\u2019ve been in this position before where they said, you\u2019re not good enough, go prove them wrong again\u2019. So I was like, okay, cool, I\u2019m going to sign my scholar.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Alex Iwobi scores to make it 1-2 and celebrates
Manchester United v Fulham, Premier League, Football, Old Trafford, Manchester, UK \u2013 24 Feb 2024. [Photo Credit\/ Getty].<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Iwobi has gone on to play 352 club career games across three clubs (Arsenal, Everton and Fulham). The Super Eagles star is enjoying his best season in the Premier League, with an output of seven goals and three assists in 27 games for Marco Silva\u2019s side.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\"Soccer\t\t<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\tAdefolahan Guerreiro\t\t\t\t<\/a>
\n\t\t\t<\/h3>\n

\n\t\t\t\tAdefolahan is a multilingual journalist and writer at Soccernet Nigeria.<\/p>\n

With a track record of involvement in College sports, Adefolahan is focused on crafting engaging football content and utilising his language skills and extensive sports knowledge to enhance content accessibility for a global audience.<\/p>\n

He has interviewed Nigerian stars like Finidi George, Junior Lokosa, and Abraham Onahi Ogbu.\t\t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

Read More<\/a>Adefolahan Guerreiro<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Soccer Super Eagles and Fulham midfielder, Alex Chuka Iwobi, has revealed he nearly joined SPFL side, Celtic, before making his debut for Arsenal, Soccernet.ng reports. The 28-year-old versatile midfielder joined the famous Arsenal Hale End academy in 2004 at the tender age of eight, but he nearly got released when he was 14, and then […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":830154,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[96761,23481,2005],"tags":[96760,11722],"class_list":{"0":"post-830153","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-iwobi","8":"category-joined","9":"category-soccer","10":"tag-iwobi","11":"tag-joined"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/830153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=830153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/830153\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/830154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=830153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=830153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=830153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}