Plymouth Argyle deal Bristol City is one the Pilgrims will always want to forget - He didn't live up to Home Park hype | OneFootball

Arnold Garita never quite had the impact those at Plymouth Argyle would have hoped

Young players from abroad always bring with them a sense of intrigue, and striker Arnold Garita was no different.

The Cameroonian signed for Bristol City in January 2016 from third-tier French side Chateauroux, and many in the Football League wondered what the Robins had spotted.

By the summer, City felt it was time to get Garita some minutes, so duly sent him out on loan to then-League Two outfit Plymouth Argyle.

He was still yet to make a proper impression in English football, that blank canvas creating intrigue, but it never proved quite as thrilling as many would have hoped.

There was plenty of intrigue around Garita

The Robins signed Garita in January that year for £50,000 from Chateauroux in central France.

It was rare then, and still is to this day, for a player to go from the French third tier straight into the Football League, so the fact that the Robins were willing to stake money on the move suggested they may have found a diamond in the rough.

Upon arrival, he got one cameo for City, in the EFL Cup against Wycombe Wanderers, before his new club decided it was time to ship him out to get more minutes.

The 24 minutes he played in that cup game wasn’t enough to make a full assessment of the player, so he arrived at Home Park with near enough a blank slate; the Plymouth fans hoped they were to be the first beneficiaries of the Robins’ scouting work.

Garita at Plymouth didn’t quite work out

It did not quite go as all would have originally hoped for Garita.

He made just 17 appearances for the Pilgrims in total, 14 of which in League Two and only eight in the starting line-up in the league.

He did manage two league goals and two assists during that time, which isn’t the worst return considering his limited minutes, but it wasn’t the bursting onto the scene that many would have hoped for when he first arrived in the summer.

Hampered by injury and selection issues, Garita returned not a whole lot better off than where he started before travelling down to Home Park.

Garita was not cut out for the Football League in the end

The Cameroonian’s relatively quite loan spell with Plymouth would be Garita’s main and final contribution to English football.

In the summer of 2018, he was released by Bristol City, that EFL outing his sole senior appearance for the Robins.

He moved to Belgian side Royal Charleroi that year, before being loaned immediately to French outfit USL Dunkerque.

Further stints in France, Belgium, Saudi Arabia and Israel followed, but Garita would never return to the English game.