Think people are being a bit harsh on Garnacho. If he was given a run at LW he would outshine Rashford very quickly. The problem we have is constantly accommodating our high earners who regularly put in average performances.
Do we have enough goals in the squad?
- Thread starter ManUnitedCanuck
- Start date
Considering we need 4 or 5 goals a game to draw or win, we definitely don’t have enough goals in the squad
Horrible looking at that on the page.
Especially when we're by even the calmest assessment 2 game changing attackers off what we need.
Garnacho and Amad should be squaddies looking up to the main players. Instead they're regular starters and it's not fair on them and why we'll probably end up 6th or 7th at best.
It's hard to see how we get rid too.
Would he even go for 20m?
4th or 5th choice wide attacker for a player whose fee says he should be a top 5 in league level game changer is just so mad it's unreal.
What makes it even worse is that Ten Hag saw his best at Ajax, yet decided he was a must buy. Even at the time people on redcafe posted misgivings and were saying his level was average.
What other top club relies so much on players that are simply not the finished product? Garnacho, Amad, Højlund, Zirkzee, etc. Almost all our main attacking players are developing, yet we expect consistent performances.
It does make you wonder after 3 seasons of watching us struggle for goals, would we really have been any worse off if we had just kept ronaldo and not wasted money hojlund and zirkzee and used it on a midfielder or winger, actually scratch that, eth with money to spend is a bad combination.
Hojlund, Zirkzee and Antony. Over £200m spent as badly as possible.
Has to be the worst set of forwards we've ever had.
Has to be the worst set of forwards we've ever had.
I wish I could be bothered to quote the posters who thought this team had players capable for scoring 15+ goals. I believe one even thought we could score over 70 in the PL this season.
We are seriously fecked when it comes to goal scoring. It was bad enough last year but could possibly be worse this season.
We are seriously fecked when it comes to goal scoring. It was bad enough last year but could possibly be worse this season.
We’ll be lucky to score fecking 40.
We were heavily relying on Rashford gaining back the form of 2 years ago but it's not looking likely is it.. we are fecked
I talked about this all summer…squad needed a goal scorer and we completely ignored that in the market. Will cost us many points throughout the season
The real question is do we have enough footballers in the team?
We couldn't score in a free brothel
Set up the midfield and wingers to create and we'll be...
Well better hopefully.
Well better hopefully.
I mean it's very clear that the #1 reason for the lack of goals is not because we are lacking players. Sure we don't have enough to be a title challenging side... But we are 19th in the league in goals. 19th. That's pathetic from Ten Hag.
I think this is the first time in nearly 30 years of being a United fan that not a single attacking player excites me. There’s no player I think, I can’t wait to watch him this weekend.
They could all be sold and I wouldn’t have a care in the world. It’s especially true for the striker’s position, choosing between Hojlund and Zirkzee is enough to want the season to end already because we aren’t going anywhere with either.
They could all be sold and I wouldn’t have a care in the world. It’s especially true for the striker’s position, choosing between Hojlund and Zirkzee is enough to want the season to end already because we aren’t going anywhere with either.
This lot has to be our worst frontline in a long long time. Not helped by a shit manager obviously but looking at them I have zero confidence in any of them. And I'm not only talking about our strikers. I'm also including our wingers
It's not just that they are poor but some of them are not conducive to combination play. When you think of good attacking teams, you think of pace, power, shooting ability, combination play, intricate touch and passing under pressure and in tight spaces. When you think of Rasmus, Zirkzee, Rashford, Garnacho and Bruno do those things come to mind?
If we play a front four of Rasmus, Rashford, Garnacho and Bruno then that is individual moments FC. We are flipping a coin that these players will do something positive rather than feck up.
If we play a front four of Zirkzee, Amad, Mount or Mainoo and Rashford then I think we see a lot better attacking moves. Keeping the ball better, more sustained attacks and chances. We can only afford one coin flip player in the attacking four. Until then our attacks will look like they do currently, a crapshoot with the emphasis being on the crap.
Pound for pound, the Antony signing must be the worst not just in United history, but in the history of the game. Can anyone think of any others as bad?
I mean, I don't want to shit on him, the guy did ok when he came on yesterday, and he shows a bit more fight than a lot of others in the team, but for what we spent on him, f**k me it's been terrible!
I mean, I don't want to shit on him, the guy did ok when he came on yesterday, and he shows a bit more fight than a lot of others in the team, but for what we spent on him, f**k me it's been terrible!
It was a textbook panic buy.
Who knew we'd be missing McTominay's goals so early into the season?
Not just us, but any major club ever
Christ that is depressing. If they were kids that came up through the youth system it wouldn't feel so bad, but to spend that much on them, Jesus!
It was pretty much guaranteed, he scored a few last year and is a threat in the air and in the ground!
Let’s be serious here a team that has ambitions on finishing top 4/5 in domestic league and wining the Europa League with good domestic cup runs will play 60 games a season and needs to score 120 goals throughout the squad.
Even in ETH first relatively successful season, we played 63 games and scored 107 goals in all competitions.
Here’s a list of all the goal scorers in 22/23 season;
Marcus Rashford - 55GP. 30G. 11A
Bruno Fernandes - 56GP. 13G. 18A
Anthony Martial - 22GP. 9G 3A
A Garnaucho. - 31GP. 5G. 4A
C Ronaldo. - 12GP. 3G. 2A
Fred. - 49GP. 6G. 6A
Casemiro. - 45GP. 7G. 6A
Jadon Sancho. - 40GP. 7G. 4A
Antony. - 40GP. 8G. 3A
S McTominay. - 38GP. 2G. 2A
C Eriksen. - 39GP. 2G 12A
M Sabitzer. - 15GP. 3G. 1A
Wout Weghorst. - 28GP. 2G. 3A
Defence - 63GP 5G. 11A
Own Goals. 5G
Looking at Eric’s best season, because it’s only downhill after this it’s clear that he does not know how to construct an Elite squad, he goes on about two international players for every position and he hardly rotates, burning players out. Your Front 4 attacking players and 4 Shadow attacking players must score 70-80% of your goals so if you want a team that scores 120 goals per season from 60 games you need 90 goals from these players and each player should be targeted accordingly;
M Rashford/15, R Hojlund/15,
A Garnaucho/ 15, B Fernandes /15
From 45-55 matches Played
Amad /8, Antony/7, J Zirkzee/8, M Mount/7
From 25-35 matches Played
Currently scored 12 Goals from 90 or 13% of their collective target against 18% of the season played.
Then you target your Midfield as follows;
Eriksen/5, Casemiro/5, K Mainoo/5
M Ugarte/2, T Collyer/2, Other 1
That’s 20 goals
Currently scored 3 Goals or 15% of its Target against 18% Played
And Finally you target your defence as a collective to get 10 Goals.
The team has played 11 games in all competitions and have completed approximately 18% of the season.
Currently only the defence is on target to achieve its collective goal bonus of 10 goals as the club has scored 2 goals from defence or 20% of its target.
It’s clear our 8 attacking options for the front 4 positions are letting us down but then you see baffling decisions from ETH when players like Rashford start to find scoring form, they get benched.
Only Mount and Bruno have not scored yet in our attack but 11 games for Bruno is 5 goals that the club is missing add that to the midfield scoring issues and Garnaucho, Zirkzee and Amad being far too wasteful and you can see the issues, we should have probably scored another 1 goal per game and then you have 6 points in Europa League and probably 13 in the PL.
INEOS should give the squad collective goal scoring bonuses for the Attack, the Midfield and The Defence and then watch players start to be less selfish and pas to each other more.
However, it is clear to note that Fred, Mctominay and Sabitzer all got goals from Midfield and ran past the strikers, who do we currently have who does that in this squad, yet again poor Squad Planing, United needed a BTB goal scoring midfield player as well as a number 6 and needed an experienced CF as well as an upgrade on Antony, however if he scores 7 more goals this season, he would have achieved his target from 25-30 matches played!
You can never have too many strikers just ask Sir Alex who said , they force each other to score more goals for the benefit of the team.
What makes it worse is that ETH had Mohamed Kudas who was clearly the better player and we could have bought him for £45m less and used the other £40m to add to Hojlund fee and bought Kane, absolute embarrassment of a Manager and he must be sacked this week.
Harry Kane would have flopped here and Levy wouldn’t have sold him to us at all.
You just know we'll be buying Kane in another couple of years when he's gone from fairly immobile to absolutely immobile with arguments on the cafe about how he "guarantees goals" and even if it's "Only for a season or 2" it'll be worth it.
Answer to this is obviously no. We’ve improved our defence but got worse with scoring.
The annoying thing is that we spent god knows how much on forwards and none of them play like a target man which we so desperately need for about 10 years now. Everyone is basically Rashford lite, great playing off the shoulders of defenders while struggling to beat a man one on one. We really don't need 4 different versions of Rashford.
Why are we perpetually fascinated with lightweight forwards who are somewhat pacy but are shite in the air and generally need 10 shots to score 1 goal?
Why are we perpetually fascinated with lightweight forwards who are somewhat pacy but are shite in the air and generally need 10 shots to score 1 goal?
For me it’s confidence
We’ve seen rashford when he’s on form he’s almost unplayable
When Bruno is on fire he’s a 40 goal (assist/goals) player
Garnacho has won games on his own, they are just mentally defeated and I put this squarely on the manager. 1 or 2 misfiring and I’d blame the players but every single player in our out field is underperforming by their own standards which reflects leadership
I don’t think any of our strikers really suit playing upfront on their own which is an issue.
Hojlunds holdup play is non existent. Zirkzee can help link play but he’s never going to be prolific. Rashford would look better in a 2, he can’t lead the line.
Hojlunds holdup play is non existent. Zirkzee can help link play but he’s never going to be prolific. Rashford would look better in a 2, he can’t lead the line.
I think it's one of his strongest attributes, we also don't know whether Zirkzee's never going to be prolific.
Bruno has never achieved 40 goals and assists in any PL season for us it’s a myth
He got 45 GA in 20/21 in all competitions with 28 goals and 17 Assists from 58 Matches and that was only once!
Bruno 19/20 half a season - Goals 8/7 Assists = 15 from 14 Matches
Bruno. 21/22 Season - Goals 10/14 Assists = 24 from 46 Matches
Bruno 22/23 Season - Goals 14/14 Assists =
28 From 59 Games
Bruno 23/24 Season - Goals 15/13 Assists =
28 from 48 Games
In PL he has 8, 18, 10, 8, 10 and currently 0 from 7 PL games this season so his total is 54 Goals from 166 matches and we’ve won 86 matches with a 51.80% win rate when he plays.
More importantly he’s in huge decline, he’s actually a myth and a flat track bully, rarely scoring against the Top 6 and wait for it he has 19 Penalties and just 1 Free Kick goal in those 54 goals. I really don’t think Real, Bayern, Barca or City or Liverpool would want him. He needs to start earning his huge salary or we should ship him to Saudi for £80m if the offer still available and go buy Musialla or Florian Wirtz for the same, both are huge upgrades on Bruno!
Let’s assume Rashford was the penalty taker and scored 90% of those penalties now add 17 goals to Rashford stats over the same period from 2019 to 2024 - 168 matches and 57 Goal and 1 Free Kick and 4 Penalties, if he had been the pen taker and scored 90% as I suggested, No one would be saying anything about Rashford has he would have 74 Goals from 168 Matches.
And unlike Bruno, Marcus record against all the top teams is as good as any in the EPL, guy was terrible last year but he looks back to something resembling his best and he’s getting benched and dropped when an on form Rashford is the only elite Striker from our 8 options including Bruno and Mount that can get 20-30 goals this season.
Bruno has been one of our best signings mostly because we’ve been so terrible in the transfer market but had Pogba lived up to his ability, United signed both Cavani or Zlatan, 5 years earlier and Greenwood not ruined his United career we wouldn’t be mention Bruno name and we certainly wouldn’t have given a 30 year old a new 3 year contract on £300k per year!
You’ve shown they are better players than currently showing and a good manager would get more out of them
I would honestly like to see a forward line/Midfield of:
Garnacho/Rashford-Hojlund-Amad
------‐--------Zirkzee (Second Striker)
Eriksen/Mainoo/Casemiro
--‐------------Urgate
Essentially a 4-2-4 with the front line moving around freely, the number 8 supporting and the 6 dropping back when needed/breaking up play to get us on the front foot again
Rashford 10
Garnacho 10
Bruno 10
Hojlund 10
Everyone else 20 in total
60 goals won’t be enough
Garnacho 10
Bruno 10
Hojlund 10
Everyone else 20 in total
60 goals won’t be enough
Guirassy instead of Zirkzee was obvious.
I think it's a matter of how we play. Simple goals which anyone can score by being in the right place are created through great teamplay. Individual brilliance is not only harder to find, the goals scored are lower percentage ones because you have to beat defenders and a goalie in good positions. So maybe it's the system?
Still can't believe we have only scored 1 goal at home in the league, that is seriously blunt