The Cameroonian has already gotten off to a spectacularly bad start as a Doria player, causing friction between Samp’s president and coach.
After Samuel Eto’o put pen to paper, he spoke of his ambition to take Sampdoria into the Champions League and use his experience of having played at the highest level to inspire and lead his new teammates.
The Cameroonian striker made his debut on the weekend, with 20 minutes left as the Blucerchiati trailed 3–0 away at Torino. Sampdoria eventual 5–1 defeat was obviously not solely his responsibility but it was hardly an auspicious start to his career at the Ligurian club.
Although Eto’o’s subsequent ability to draw attention away from the circus of transfer deadline day was a mildly entertaining side-story, it hints that Sampdoria may soon — if not already — be regretting ever signing him.
Following the side’s embarrassing performance in Turin, the coach Sinisa Mihajlovic scheduled a double training session to try and get things back on track. Reports then suggested that Eto’o simply absconded from the club’s training centre at Bogliasco without attending the afternoon’s session or telling the club where he was heading.
Naturally, Mihajlovic was not best pleased with the new star striker’s insubordination and had strong words to say about the player who he blamed entirely for the row.
“In order to have a row, you need two people and quite frankly Eto’o did everything himself,” Mihajlovic told Gazzetta dello Sport.
“He just left. He told the club and it is certainly a grave lack of respect towards me and the entire team. I don’t know what the club intends to do. That is the only truth of the matter.”
Whilst Samp’s famously eccentric owner Massimo Ferrero has declared that the issue has now been resolved and that Eto’o has returned to regular training, the squabble has exposed wider problems surrounding Eto’o which run the risk of damaging the relationship between the president and the coaching staff.
Ferrero’s reign has begun very well and he has funded some good signings and given Mihajlovic the space do to his job. But Eto’o is very much his signing and he is clearly already in Mihajlovic’s bad books.
Eto’o gives the appearance of being Ferrero’s trophy signing and, on the face of it, he doesn’t add a huge amount to the team. Fellow Sampdoria striker Luis Muriel revealed that Mihajlovic told him he wanted him at the Marassi so it wouldn’t be a surprise if the coach already had his favourites in mind.
The Blucerchiati already have a number of strikers with Gonzalo Bergessio, Eder, and Stefano Okaka present and, instead of a healthy competition for places, there is a risk of the squad becoming cluttered.
Eto’o has already displayed a disrespectful lack of work ethic by skipping training as well as during his prior stint at Anzhi Makhachkala. Speculation of a move to China further paints him as the villain, and effectively a player out for money rather than the glory.
One would expect a new arrival to keep his head down and put a shift in, but the Cameroonian’s behaviour is in stark contrast to that of Angelo Palombo and Pedro Obiang who both humbly apologised to supporters after the Torino defeat and reiterated the need for hard graft.
Sampdoria didn’t quite manage the incredible feat of signing a big name and letting him go in the same transfer window however, as Eto’o remains a Samp player. The club now knows it cannot rely too much on him and the main task ahead is to ensure he doesn’t cause any more damage to team spirit and instead focus on his football.
The worst case scenario is that he become so disruptive as to bring the hardworking and reserved Mihajlovic into conflict with the showman that is Ferrero; for that would ruin all the hard work that Sampdoria have accomplished so far this season.
Follow Luca Gunby on Twitter at: @Gunbyzono
