How big a priority has rebuilding our attack become?

sullydnl

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At the start of the season it didn't seem like this would be an immediate priority but looking at the current situation, a lot has changed.

We know Cavani will be gone in the summer. Ronaldo has at best an extremely short shelf-life too, isn't offering anywhere near enough and could easily be gone in the summer. Lingard will be gone. Martial is halfway out the door already. Greenwood won't be coming back. Even Juan Mata who barely plays will be going.

That only really leaves us with Sancho, Elanga and Rashford as attackers. And the latter's performances have been such that there's already a thread asking if he should be sold as well. Of the three Sancho is arguably the only one you would think should be in a first choice attack for us.

Rangnick has already said it's obvious that we need a CF in the summer, so we can assume that will be a priority. But how much of a rebuild is needed in attack beyond that? And how much of a priority does strengthening beyond that one CF signing this summer become? Should we be bringing in multiple attackers this summer even at the cost of strengthening elsewhere?
 
Huge.

We've failed to score 80PL goals in a season ever since Fergie's left. That's disgraceful.
 
Huge. It’s becoming a bigger need than DM by virtue of the fact we’ll possibly have no central striker going into the Summer. I believe we’ll miss top 4 and rumours indicate Ronaldo has a release clause in that eventuality. I think, given the need to rebuild several parts of the squad, we need to be smart and buy cheaper targets with high potential.

Today’s links to Cody Gakpo (LW but can probably develop centrally) and Joao Palhinha (DM) are in the vein of signings I hope we’ll be in for, as much as I’d love Tchouameni, Rice etc. We’ll be linked to Charles De Ketelaere soon. Mark my words.
 
Its almost as important as CM now and as you said in the OP, I don't think any of us could see this coming at the start of the season.
 
Arguably more important than midfield. People are focusing on a striker but we desperately need a Greenwood replacement too. We also need a way of shifting Ronaldo out the door.
 
If you don’t score you don’t win games.

Rebuilding the attack with 2-3 players is now the number one priority, even more so than midfield.
 
The whole team needs rebuilding. Midfield, fullbacks, a sweeper keeper, attack a new CB. Thats more or less the entire team
 
We need a new no.9, and an actual specialist RW.

In all honesty there’s no one position in our side that couldn’t be improved. But I’d say the priority list is like:
DM > Striker > RW > CM > RB/CB
 
One of the many things that looks worse and worse with hindsight about Ole’s time in charge is that Elanga and he who shall not be named are the only two academy products to break through and get any kind of meaningful minutes over the last two or three years. So we have no idea if any of these gaps in our squad can be filled from within.

Compare and contrast with what’s been going on at Liverpool (or even a sugar daddy club like Chelsea) and it’s so fecking depressing.
 
If Ronaldo is still here next season he's still going to be our starting striker though, whether or not we think he should. So we would be looking for a striker that can take over from Ronaldo when he's contract is up. We also need a winger because Sancho is really the only one we have that should be starting. The likes of Pellistri Elanga and Diallo are raw and Rashford is just shit

Ideally we can get a striker like Gouiri or Nunez that can play both striker or winger.

ST - Ronaldo, Nunez
LW - Rashford, Elanga, Nunez
RW - Sancho, Pellistri
 
jamesjimmybyrondean said:
If Ronaldo is still here next season he's still going to be our starting striker though, whether or not we think he should. So we would be looking for a striker that can take over from Ronaldo when he's contract is up. We also need a winger because Sancho is really the only one we have that should be starting. The likes of Pellistri Elanga and Diallo are raw and Rashford is just shit

Ideally we can get a striker like Gouiri or Nunez that can play both striker or winger.

ST - Ronaldo, Nunez
LW - Rashford, Elanga, Nunez
RW - Sancho, Pellistri
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No we should get rid of Ronaldo
 
More important than anything else now.

Greenwood gone
Rashford not able so far
Ronaldo surely gone if we scrape top 4 or not unless he's ok with being used sparingly
Cavani gone
Martial perhaps won't want to come back, probably best for a new start

All we have is Elanga and Sancho for next season

Also depending on the manager we need to create a style of play and have suitable attackers.
 
If we can shift Ronnie we have to. He's not going to get any better, only worse. Plus it's a world cup year, so he's definitely going to be 'saving' himself for that in the winter. Cavani's leaving.

Not discussing any of the actual situation, but does anyone know if football contracts would likely have a morality clause? If not, I'm assuming we're paying hte best part of 750k a week for 3 forwards that are offering extremely little.

That is a huge pot of cash to throw at someone else, whomever it may end up being.

Personally want to never see the name Raoila again and think Haaland's already showing signs of slowing down, so pretty much anyone but him. Get someone young with huge energy - a modern forward who is hungry and let's go from there.

Til then, I'd be extremly tempted to push Elanga or Rashford through the middle. Neither is what a club with our wage bill should be forced into, but poor squad management has consequences.
 
I think our strategy should be to get either a Striker or a Left Footed RW this summer. Best one available in either category

Personally I think we can live with the current strike options for a bit (even with Ronaldo out of the picture - Bruno, Rashford, Elanga, Martial). However if we can get our hands on Haaland, just get him and plug the RW the following summer
 
RW: Elanga, Amad
LW: Sancho, Rashford
CF: ??, ??

Unless Martial comes back (unlikely), we're likely to need 2 strikers: ideally, one would be a targetman and the other a fox-in-the-box. An in-form Rashford could also provide cover in an injury crisis.

The one thing that I really liked about LvG was his strategy of having a first XI of experienced stars, and a subs bench of kids from the Academy. It's probably not realistic, but maybe Charlie McNeill will be ready to make the jump like Elanga or Macheda before him. Next season is still 6 months away.
 
Beachryan said:
Get someone young with huge energy - a modern forward who is hungry and let's go from there.

Til then, I'd be extremly tempted to push Elanga or Rashford through the middle. Neither is what a club with our wage bill should be forced into, but poor squad management has consequences.
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Which is where Juve have made absolute mugs of us. Lumbering us with 37 year old Ronaldo and replacing him with 22 year old Vlahovic.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
One of the many things that looks worse and worse with hindsight about Ole’s time in charge is that Elanga and he who shall not be named are the only two academy products to break through and get any kind of meaningful minutes over the last two or three years. So we have no idea if any of these gaps in our squad can be filled from within.

Compare and contrast with what’s been going on at Liverpool (or even a sugar daddy club like Chelsea) and it’s so fecking depressing.
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That's a lack of investment in the youth set up rather than on Ole. Chelsea have dominated the Youth Cup for years, hardly surprising they have quality coming through.
 
Dante said:
RW: Elanga, Amad
LW: Sancho, Rashford
CF: ??, ??

Unless Martial comes back (unlikely), we're likely to need 2 strikers: ideally, one would be a targetman and the other a fox-in-the-box. An in-form Rashford could also provide cover in an injury crisis.

The one thing that I really liked about LvG was his strategy of having a first XI of experienced stars, and a subs bench of kids from the Academy. It's probably not realistic, but maybe Charlie McNeill will be ready to make the jump like Elanga or Macheda before him. Next season is still 6 months away.
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Martial should be kept because buying two strikers in the summer isn't going to happen. That's assuming we can get rid of Ronaldo, otherwise we're stuck with him as starter.
 
Leftback99 said:
That's a lack of investment in the youth set up rather than on Ole. Chelsea have dominated the Youth Cup for years, hardly surprising they have quality coming through.
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We supposedly completely revamped our youth set up when Butt was appointed in February 2016. This seasons 20 year olds would have been 14 years old at the time. We should surely be seeing the benefit of that investment by now.
 
Our attacking options are a huge problem.

Bigger than any other problem with the players on the pitch.

I’ve said it before, and for a long time, we do not keep the ball well enough in the final third to have any kind of sustained success in terms of winning games.

We lose possession too easily and don’t defend well enough as a unit to negate our inability to keep the ball.

We Are also tactically naive in terms of allowing the opposition to get from back to front too quickly and then from front to back to get in a defensive shape.

There was one point late on yesterday where they had 4 players in our penalty area and the perceived lethargy that we had to get the ball in to their penalty area was embarrassing. Unfortunately, it is one example of many.

So much wrong with it and it isn’t helped by some of the players just not being good enough
 
Its a massive issue. It's not just the lack of numbers, it's the poor mix as well.
With the exception of Sancho and Martial(whose career here is finished), all our attackers are selfish, don't play with their head up and are poor decision makers when in the box. Its a terrible mix.
 
Will hold my hands up I didn't expect Edi to feature quite so little and then of course who saw the Mason thing coming either. Looks very stupid letting Martial go out on loan in that situation.
 
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The more I think about this the more my expectations for what our new manager can do next season drop. We seem to need a rebuild now as much as we did at any other point in the post-SAF years. Quite a turnaround given when this season started it was supposed to be the culmination of years of patience with the previous rebuild.

Though tbf they couldn't have seen the Greenwood thing coming and he would have been seen as a lynchpin in the attack over the next decade. If we still had a Greenwood we expected to keep improving in the squad then the attack wouldn't look so grim.
 
Leftback99 said:
Martial should be kept because buying two strikers in the summer isn't going to happen. That's assuming we can get rid of Ronaldo, otherwise we're stuck with him as starter.
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Ideally, we'd keep him. But I don't think he'll want to come back.
 
Why do people think Ronaldo won't be here next season even if we don't make cl? He simply has nowhere else to go.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
We supposedly completely revamped our youth set up when Butt was appointed in February 2016. This seasons 20 year olds would have been 14 years old at the time. We should surely be seeing the benefit of that investment by now.
Click to expand...
The current Youth Cup team seems to be doing ok, Elanga coming through are good signs. Then again we supposedly revamped our scouting system but still decided Ronaldo and Cavani were good ideas.
 
The first thing we need to sort is a manager who knows how to get the optimal performance out of our players.

Attack, Midfield and Defence all need an overhaul.
 
The issue around our attack has really crept up on us and looks like it’s going to hit us hard in the summer. Greenwood gone, Cavani and Ronaldo will both go, potentially Martial, no one knows whether Rashford can regain his form from 2019. Our options are looking scarce and it’s going to take a pretty large transfer war chest to bring in the right players. We are going to need a RW who can play regularly as well as a proper number 9 who can play regularly if needed but might be required to rotate with other forwards. That’s going to take upwards of £100m already depending on who we go for, that’s forgetting that we will want to spend a large sum on a midfield player too. Someone like McNeil might get drafted in, and I’m sure Garner will get games too but it’s not nearly enough.
 
In the last 4 games we have had 92 shots and scored 3 goals.

It’s massive and unbelievable with the squad we started the season with.

Go get Harry Kane and Antony from Ajax and another younger cheaper option.

That gives us kane, Ronaldo, another striker, Antony, sancho, Bruno, elanga and rashford next season
 
Green_Red said:
The first thing we need to sort is a manager who knows how to get the optimal performance out of our players.

Attack, Midfield and Defence all need an overhaul.
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Would prioritise DM, ST & CM then for me would look at either RW or RB who offers something going forward.
 
jamesjimmybyrondean said:
Why do people think Ronaldo won't be here next season even if we don't make cl? He simply has nowhere else to go.
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I don't quite get this either. He's getting paid a ridiculous amount and isn't very good anymore, the notion that clubs are going to be trying to take him off us seems fanciful. The forward areas desperately need re-tooling though given that Cavani, Mata and Greenwood won't be options next season, Rashford looks seriously diminished due to us repeatedly playing him while injured and Ronaldo is almost finished at this stage. Sancho is the only senior attacking player that there can be much hope around along with some of the youngsters (Elanga, maybe Amad).
 
ForeverRed1 said:
In the last 4 games we have had 92 shots and scored 3 goals.

It’s massive and unbelievable with the squad we started the season with.

Go get Harry Kane and Antony from Ajax and another younger cheaper option.

That gives us kane, Ronaldo, another striker, Antony, sancho, Bruno, elanga and rashford next season
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Ronny will not play in Europa League nor Kane
 
Green_Red said:
I felt that watching the game yesterday, AWB looks lost sometimes. We also need a CB.
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We at least have options at CB, my mate is a big blues fan and says he's done well at Brum so maybe deserves a chance
 
I personally feel attacking wise we are stacked already, the problem is we have so many out of form and poor players.

Ronaldo scored from more difficult angles last year but this year he’s missing sitters same with bruno. Rashford I don’t have any hope he needed to be replaced surely with Amad or a promising academy player.

If Ronaldo gets his form back, we will sign only 1 CF for cavani replacement and recall Martial(based on loan performance) and loan out rashford.

The squad size looks neat and simple now, so we should continue with current replacments and not again bloat this squad.
 
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