Park Chu-Young's transfer to North London in August 2011 was a surprise at the time and a disaster in hindsight.
If you ever need an example of a bad choice then see the South Korean's decision to suddenly drop negotiations with French champions Lille after three solid years with AS Monaco and head to England.
Park arrived at the Emirates as a 26-year-old: Korea's best striker and one of the top goal-scorers in Asia. The 2004 Young Asian Player of the Year left the club after seven league minutes and no goals scored; forever destined to have the word "flop" used next to his name in the English media. More importantly, his relationship with the Korean national team was left in tatters.
In 2015, Park moved home to FC Seoul. His professional career had started in the capital in 2005 when he became a sensation in Korea and Asia -- a frenzy that did the player no favours as he was never able to live up to the early hype. But, returning to the K-League, it was hoped that he could rebuild his career and try to enjoy his football once again.
Fast-forward to 2016 and is doing all that and more. It's not easy to score goals in the K-League, it rarely has been. It is a place where defences are as strong in the belief in counter-attacking. Good strikers can struggle.
Take Camilo Sanvezzo. The Brazilian was a star with the Vancouver Whitecaps, winning the MLS Golden Boot in 2013 and then going to Mexico to become the joint top scorer in the 2014 Apertura. Yet in Korea, he is regarded as a flop, just another foreign striker who came and left without scoring a single goal in seven games.
Former Whitecaps boss Martin Rennie moved to Korea in 2014 to coach and told ESPN FC that Camilo wasn't a failure.
"He never scored in Korea but was great in MLS and Mexico. He's a good player but never showed it," he said. "That is the case for a lot of guys. It can be hard for strikers here."
If a striker in Korea manages to break the 20-goal barrier in a long 38 game season, then he is considered to have done very well indeed. In 2015, the top scorer -- FC Seoul's Adriano -- scored 18, with nobody else getting above 15.
This season however, of the top goal-scorers, the striker with the best goal-per-minutes ratio in the league is Park. The former Gunner has found the back of the net every 115 minutes. That's six goals in six starts with the best coming last weekend just when it was needed.
FC Seoul started the season well but results had suffered of late with no wins in five. Coach Choi Yong-Soo departed suddenly for Jiangsu Suning in the Chinese Super League in June to be replaced by Hwang Sun-Hong (Choi's rival for the title of Korea's best-ever goal-scorer.)
However, Hwang struggled in his early days in the capital. Adriano was hit by a lengthy suspension giving Park more time to play and last weekend, starting just behind Dejan Damjanovic, he gave his coach a first league win in spectacular fashion.
With the score at 1-1 against Incheon United, Park picked up the ball almost 30 yards from goal and smashed a shot into the back of the net before goalkeeper Cho Soo-Hyuk had a chance to move.
Instead of the usual falling to the knees in prayer celebration, Park put the ball inside his shirt in homage to teammates Osmar Barba and Shim Woo-Yeon whose wives had just given birth. In contrast to his quiet public persona, Park has always been popular and full of smiles with teammates, in Korea at least.
It was the kind of goal scored by strikers who are full of confidence. Had it been another player, there would have probably been plenty of mentions in the media of a possible call-up for the national team.
Ex-Arsenal striker Park Chu-young scored a stunning winning goal for FC Seoul against Incheon. pic.twitter.com/awxZSItqog
- Korea Football News (@KORFootballNews) July 17, 2016
As yet, it hasn't happened and is unlikely to. Re-establishing himself as a fine K-League player may have to be the limit of Park's ambition -- though the 31-year-old is unlikely to want more himself.
Park's 2012 decision to use a residency permit gained from his time with Monaco as a way to delay his mandatory military service in Korea by a decade was hugely controversial and angered many at home. He was soon back in Seoul to make a public apology.
With that and the increasing inactivity at Arsenal, subsequent call-ups became harder to justify and Park played little part in the later stages of qualification for the 2014 World Cup.
He was recalled early in 2014 by Hong Myung-Bo and scored a great goal against Greece in Athens but performed poorly when it mattered in Brazil. Indeed, Park's selection was held up as a prime example of all that was wrong with Hong as a coach and he was last seen on national duty trying to dodge a hail of candy that fans threw at the squad as it returned home from South America.
To return now would just mean more controversy for a player who has had too much in his career. Park is better off to just enjoy his football and the feeling of scoring goals once again.