What does the future hold for Melbourne Victory star Daniel Arzani? Whatever it is or wherever it may lead him, the Socceroo wants to avoid making the same mistakes.
Arzani is in some of the best form of his career as the 26-year-old tries to lead Victory to back-to-back Isuzu UTE A-League Grand Finals.
The Subway Socceroos winger has three goals and six assists this season, while he has returned to the international fold under former Victory boss Tony Popovic.
Arzani is out of contract at the end of the campaign and while he is focused on the Finals Series, the nine-time Socceroo is eager to learn from the past following previous experiences abroad.
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He was signed by Manchester City in 2018 before being loaned out to Scottish powerhouse Celtic. That is where things turned pear-shaped after tearing his anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) on debut.
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From there, he bounced around on loan, searching for game time, confidence, and a return to form through stints in the Netherlands with FC Utrecht, Denmark via AGF Aarhus and Belgium at SK Lommel – another City Football Group (CFG) club – but the Australian was only seen in fits and starts.
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Asked about his future on this week’s episode of Total A-Leagues, Arzani said: “I’m not exactly sure.
“There’s a really important game coming up this weekend, which I’m really focused on and there’s a really important window with the national team, which I’m really hoping that I can be involved with as well right now. Those are my priorities.
“The stint that I had overseas, for me was super disappointing and felt like a massive, almost waste of time. I think what didn’t help me was that I was constantly doing these five, six-month loan deals while being signed to City – that just doesn’t work out.
“It’s too difficult to go into teams and just start performing straight off after five months and get into a starting line-up. You’re in and out and you’re not really that important to the club.
“So I’m hoping that if I was to make that move over, it would be on a permanent transfer, and hopefully that way I’d be given more of a chance as well.”
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After Arzani’s interview, retired Socceroo and former A-Leagues star Tommy Oar discussed the Australian attacker.
“There’s not been many young Australian players like him in the last kind of 10, 20, years, to be honest,” said Oar.
“I think he’s so exciting every time he gets the ball. I do think if you look at kind of his trajectory, and you know why there’s maybe been so many critics, I think that he’s a little bit maybe a victim of his own early success.
“Because when he broke onto the scene, he was obviously mesmerizing to watch. He was so young, got into the Socceroos, went to the World Cup, and everybody put his level so high so early, that any time he didn’t play that to that level, he was quickly criticised.
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“I think that can be a little bit harsh, because especially over the last few months. I think that for somebody, if there was someone who’d never seen Daniel Arzani play, and you saw him play over the last few months, you’d be thinking, Who is this kid? He’s unbelievable.
“The way he takes players on is so positive. So I do empathise with him a little bit in terms of the criticism that he cops, but at the same time, I think that he’s matured a lot in recent times.
This season, it was a really important season. Remember him obviously at Macarthur, things didn’t work out for him the way he would have wanted.
“I think that this was a really decisive season. And so far, particularly in the second half of the season, he’s kind of reminded everyone of how good he is.”
