2010: Tiote A Liability

Alreet lads and lasses. Thanks for accepting me. Long time reader. Long time…non contributor? Anyway, I was curious… I remember how little we knew of Tiote back when we signed him in 2010. I know it’s almost sacrilege to mention the old 606 on here, but I had a quick look back to see what some of us made of his signing, and it was quite funny to see the response.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/606/A73301852
Some of the comments were as follows:

“Tiote is clearly a utility player, ie backup.”
“I see him as someone who dribbles for the sake of it.”
“Tiote is no better than either Barton or Nolan, he’s pretty average to be honest. He’s a liability.”
“He is way too slow to become a consistent Premier League player.”

I’ll admit – I knew virtually nothing of him either, so I can’t say much. I know hindsight is a wonderful thing, but what similar misconceptions have you had?

I’ll start – Having seen Albert Luque tear AC Milan to shreds the season before he arrived on Tyneside, I thought he’d be immense. I even thought he might prove a better acquisition than the marquee signing of 2005 – Michael Owen. I was also gutted to lose Andy Carroll, Kevin Nolan and Joey Barton, thought Seb Bassong was going to be another Diatta, and thought Alan Smith would play a pivotal role for us following his arrival in 2007.

 

Just proves how wrong people can be, however do any of the people who posted on the article still post.

 

Tiote is a true legend