Is a striker enough to make us an 80+ league goal team?

I don't like the idea of buying Kane but given we are desperate for goals and he is a proven striker in the EPL, I think the money should be spent on him.
....and writing that hurts like hell, because I don't believe he'll make a huge difference to us, but there are not many EPL-proven strikers available for less.
I also think that we must ship out the deadwood or just pay out their contracts.
Players like Martial, Bailly, DVD Beek are next to useless and we should at least get some money for this deadood.
 
Moston Red said:
I always thought the same about Aguero and he hung around like a bad smell.
Click to expand...

Hahah. Yeah, Haaland will stay for a few years before moving to a club like Madrid. I don't see why he would want to move, as long as he is winning trebles and is at the best team in the World.
 
Adding a 30 goal striker won't necessarily increase our total goal output by 30 goals.

So I don't think we need a someone to make up the difference on his own. What we need is someone who can bring out the best in what we've already got, while scoring the bare minimum that Wout/Martial failed to achieve.

I think a target man who can bring Rashford and Bruno into play will be the most productive option. Let's not forget that Bruno is one of the most prolific midfielders in Europe when he's properly unleashed. Rashford is a 30 goal per season player at his best. Mount can get 10+. Antony, Garnacho and Amad are all dangerous around the edge of the box when there's a CF pulling defenders around. Casemiro is a threat at corners if there's a big man next to him bullying opposition markers.

Even someone like Welbeck would transform this team into 70+ goal scorers. Only a slightly better forward would be enough to tip us over into 80+. We need a Firmino type player more than an Osimhen type player imo.
 
If the aim is to win a cup, then splunk the money on a striker. If the aim is to build towards challenging for the Premier, then I'd rather see us continuing to invest in getting a balanced squad with real depth (2 decent options for each position) as it's such a long season.

For me, bringing in 2 midfielders to replace 2 out of VDB and McFred; 1 CB to replace Maguire, and 1 GK to replace De Gea are higher priorities.
 
Withnail said:
A striker, a modern goalie comfortable playing out from the back and a CM and then maybe
Click to expand...

We need more than 'a' striker - at least two to start with. All players have drop off form or injuries. To suggest Rashford + another is not enough.
 
Oh_Dear said:
If the aim is to win a cup, then splunk the money on a striker. If the aim is to build towards challenging for the Premier, then I'd rather see us continuing to invest in getting a balanced squad with real depth (2 decent options for each position) as it's such a long season.

For me, bringing in 2 midfielders to replace 2 out of VDB and McFred; 1 CB to replace Maguire, and 1 GK to replace De Gea are higher priorities.
Click to expand...

What about the ST position? We have 0 decent options there. Where is the balance in that?
 
No we don't play good enough football because our midfield isn't good enough. We need someone in there beside case and Bruno that elevates our play. Improving a GK and RB would also help.
 
bosnian_red said:
League goals only:
  • Striker - 15-25
  • Rashford - 15-20
  • Bruno - 10
  • Antony - 5-10
  • Sancho/Garnacho - 10 combined
  • Deep midfielders - 5-10 combined
  • Defenders - 5 combined
So that's a range of 65 - 90 goals I'd guess from our group with a good striker next season. Average of 77.5. I wouldn't say any of these are aggressive estimates either.

Another (math) way to look at things - we had 71.9 league xG last season. Arsenal had 76.5. Arsenal scored 88 (15% overperformance), United scored 58 (19% underperformance). Add a competent striker to pump us up 5-10 xG more than what Ronaldo/Weghorst/Martial combined for (11.69 xG) while accepting Rashford loses a bit as he's not the sole focus (he was at 18.76, drop him down by 4 or so for a net increase of 7-8 xG) brings us basically right to 80xG for next season.

Even if it's not spread out quite the same, I'm pretty confident in us getting around 80xG next season as long as we sign a striker who is capable of doing 15+ xG (which literally Martial was halfway there by playing 1/3 of the minutes of Rashford and Bruno, and being pretty mediocre). Then it's on putting away your chances more often which I'd say is more just vibes.
Click to expand...
Forgot Amad - 17
 
032Devil said:
We need more than 'a' striker - at least two to start with. All players have drop off form or injuries. To suggest Rashford + another is not enough.
Click to expand...

Well obviously in an ideal world we would need cover there because Rashford isn't a CF and we don't have any CF's we can rely on but someone like Kane can play 50 games a season and would play most weeks in the PL.

However, another CF is much lower on the list of priorities for me.
 
No chance. Not without a sharp improvement in our creativity. We struggle to create good chances in games.

How many times do you see this scenario? We arrive on the corner of the oppositions box, player A has got the ball. There's not really much on, so he gives a half-hearted two foot sideways or backwards pass to player B who looks around for a second and then just knocks it straight back to player A again, who clearly didn't want it back. You can almost see the mental shrugging. Player A then passes it 15 yards backwards to the centre half and in the meantime the opposition are set in position with their cigars out. This has been a 'feature' of our play for years and until we get better we aren't going to suddenly become free scoring no matter who is up front. A good striker would help to a degree, but this idea that'll we suddenly transform beyond recognition seems fanciful to say the least.

That said, maybe we don't need bucket loads of extra goals. 58 goals is a dismal tally, yet we still came third. How many times did we come unstuck for the want of a single goal? Even in games we won, we couldn't kill teams off and so couldn't relax, we couldn't take players off, couldn't play in second or third gear like city do and it takes it's toll. Even just a decent improvement in goals scored would help immensely.
 
Other than Rashford and the potential of Garnacho I don't think our attack has much quality. Martial and Sancho are hopeless, and Antony is too one dimensional and too one footed to be very effective. They're all quite thick, too, and often make terrible decisions that mess up decent chances.

A world class striker will help us score more goals, but it won't be enough to score enough to win the league. I think we need an upgrade on the right wing too
 
We still need a better midfield even with a top striker. Secondly, we need a more attacking RB.
 
We’re not going to be seriously challenging to win the EPL or UCL anytime soon, without a major upgrade to our midfield and an improvement to our wide attacking play.
We will struggle to even retain a top 4 finishing spot, without goal scoring strikers.
If Martial is offloaded…and it’s long overdue…we have 0 players for the CF position.
One new striker/CF won’t be enough.

.
 
For me Kane is a creator and a goal scorer.

So it’s more about if a goalscoring RW returns to our first team.

Rashford-Kane-GS RW​

is an 80 goal team.
 
The teams that score the most goals are also the teams who are best in build up, which allows them to commit their entire team in the opponent's half. You can bring in a striker but if the build up is weak then the more proactive teams will throw a spanner in the works with their proactive pressing. And in the season just gone, the strategy for the opponent was simple, press the outfield players and make them play the ball back to De Gea who will then give it away.

We've scored 70+ goals in the league with Lukaku in the team. But imo we can potentially score 90+ if we can improve our build up play and setup in a compact high block where the high press also becomes very threatening for the opponent. That's what we need to develop and that's what I believe EtH is working towards.

Gk, CM, Striker for the system to develop.
 
fergiewherearethou said:
What about the ST position? We have 0 decent options there. Where is the balance in that?
Click to expand...
That's my point. ETH took over a squad that was horribly unbalanced and lacking depth. It's unrealistic to expect us to fix all the issues in 2 transfer windows so whatever we do will leave us with weaknesses in the squad somewhere. We could spend everything we have this window on just fixing the striker position (given the prices being suggested to get a Kane, Osimhen or whatever), but I'd rather use this window to fix a series of other positions. That's all.
 
Skills said:
80 league goals should always be the minimum goal for a manchester united team. It's a total we haven't hit since Fergie retired - it's a total, he himself seldom failed to hit.

Would signing a striker be enough to make us score 80+ league goals, in your opinion? If not, where else do we need the goals coming from?
Click to expand...
I think it’s important to see how the potential strikers score their goals- are the assist similar to assist we are currently creating, can create etc? Our main creator is Bruno, couldn’t even tell you who our second is. Seems like our striker needs to be a creator as well, feeding rashford and Bruno
 
A world class striker in the mould of Kane will (in the short term) paper over the cracks we have elsewhere and make us a competitive, 80+ league goal team instantly, no doubt. This is why getting a top quality striker should ideally be prioritised over replacing De Gea or even signing a midfielder if we are serious on winning any kind of silverware next season.
 
A new GK probably will allow us score at least 15 more goals. With a new striker and a new midfielder. It can be day and night improvement further.
 
IrishRedDevil said:
Kane = +30
Click to expand...

Pretty simple, isn’t it?

Even if you discount by 7 the goals that Martial (permacrock), Ronaldo (gone, but let’s play along) and Wout (soon to be gone), Kane significantly improves everyone around him.

Yes of course we would like to upgrade on 5 or 6 positions, and perhaps we will, but we will remain stuck in second gear scraping top four at best, if we don’t upgrade at 9.
 
miked99 said:
No chance. Not without a sharp improvement in our creativity. We struggle to create good chances in games.

How many times do you see this scenario? We arrive on the corner of the oppositions box, player A has got the ball. There's not really much on, so he gives a half-hearted two foot sideways or backwards pass to player B who looks around for a second and then just knocks it straight back to player A again, who clearly didn't want it back. You can almost see the mental shrugging. Player A then passes it 15 yards backwards to the centre half and in the meantime the opposition are set in position with their cigars out. This has been a 'feature' of our play for years and until we get better we aren't going to suddenly become free scoring no matter who is up front. A good striker would help to a degree, but this idea that'll we suddenly transform beyond recognition seems fanciful to say the least.

That said, maybe we don't need bucket loads of extra goals. 58 goals is a dismal tally, yet we still came third. How many times did we come unstuck for the want of a single goal? Even in games we won, we couldn't kill teams off and so couldn't relax, we couldn't take players off, couldn't play in second or third gear like city do and it takes it's toll. Even just a decent improvement in goals scored would help immensely.
Click to expand...

It depends though, kane would certainly improve creativity as well for us. We had an xG of 71.9 as well so you have to think a proper finisher would take us about 70
 
miked99 said:
No chance. Not without a sharp improvement in our creativity. We struggle to create good chances in games.

How many times do you see this scenario? We arrive on the corner of the oppositions box, player A has got the ball. There's not really much on, so he gives a half-hearted two foot sideways or backwards pass to player B who looks around for a second and then just knocks it straight back to player A again, who clearly didn't want it back. You can almost see the mental shrugging. Player A then passes it 15 yards backwards to the centre half and in the meantime the opposition are set in position with their cigars out. This has been a 'feature' of our play for years and until we get better we aren't going to suddenly become free scoring no matter who is up front. A good striker would help to a degree, but this idea that'll we suddenly transform beyond recognition seems fanciful to say the least.

That said, maybe we don't need bucket loads of extra goals. 58 goals is a dismal tally, yet we still came third. How many times did we come unstuck for the want of a single goal? Even in games we won, we couldn't kill teams off and so couldn't relax, we couldn't take players off, couldn't play in second or third gear like city do and it takes it's toll. Even just a decent improvement in goals scored would help immensely.
Click to expand...

We do if we want to make football an enjoyable experience to watch for fans. Manchester United used to be the team you tuned into to watch a few goals every week - moreso than any other team in the country.

We're one of the most boring clubs to watch now in the top 3rd of the table.
 
Skills said:
We do if we want to make football an enjoyable experience to watch for fans. Manchester United used to be the team you tuned into to watch a few goals every week - moreso than any other team in the country.

We're one of the most boring clubs to watch now in the top 3rd of the table.
Click to expand...

I'd say Newcastle matched you in the boring stakes for a large part of this season, but yeah the 'old' Utd style of always looking to get the ball forward, create chances etc hasn't really been seen much in the last decade
 
NicolaSacco said:
I'd say Newcastle matched you in the boring stakes for a large part of this season, but yeah the 'old' Utd style of always looking to get the ball forward, create chances etc hasn't really been seen much in the last decade
Click to expand...

Newcastle still outscored us. We can talk all we want about pretty/good football, but the biggest buzz you get as a football fan (outside of celebrating a win at 90 minutes) is when your team scores a goal - and our goal totals for the last decade have been nothing short of pathetic. There's feck all to celebrate during games, forget the end of games or at the end of seasons.
 
Skills said:
Newcastle still outscored us. We can talk all we want about pretty/good football, but the biggest buzz you get as a football fan (outside of celebrating a win at 90 minutes) is when your team scores a goal - and our goal totals for the last decade have been nothing short of pathetic. There's feck all to celebrate during games, forget the end of games or at the end of seasons.
Click to expand...

Yeah fair point. I'm surprised Newcastle outscored you, that's not a particularly great fact.

Just looking at the detail of that, your 8 most played defenders; Wan Bisakka, (0) Dalot (1), Maguire (0), Martinez (1), Lindelof (0), Varane (0), Shaw (1) and Malacia (0) scored a grand total of 3 league goals last season. I know it's not their primary responsibility but you'd expect quite a few more than that I'd say.
 
Withnail said:
A striker, a modern goalie comfortable playing out from the back and a CM and then maybe
Click to expand...
It’s not just a keeper comfortable playing out from the back. The defenders need to be able to receive a pass whilst under pressure, something Maguire isn’t capable of. City under pep made lots of mistakes in their first couple of seasons and even Swindon struggle with it at times:-)
 
donrogersmoustache said:
It’s not just a keeper comfortable playing out from the back. The defenders need to be able to receive a pass whilst under pressure, something Maguire isn’t capable of. City under pep made lots of mistakes in their first couple of seasons and even Swindon struggle with it at times:-)
Click to expand...

Maguire will be gone hopefully. He played feck all games last year so I'm not even considering him as part of the squad.
 
Out of our current lot, Bruno & Rashford should be getting around 35-40 combined. Kane would be 25-30 on top of that, whereas I would expect a player new to the prem anywhere between 15-25, depending on their quality (ie Osimhen vs Muani).

Sprinkle a few goals amongst the rest (Antony, Garnacho being the next highest) and it is entirely feasible to reach 80.
 
The more I think about this subject the more you realise that the way the team is set up and plays determines just how attacking you can be and therefore how many goalscoring opportunities the team produces. Let’s look at sone Facts ;

1. Historical
City aside, only really Liverpool and Arsenal last season have really scored 80 goals plus a season, Leicester and Chelsea have both won recent leagues with Less than 75 goals.

2. Change in game and formation
The key change to City was when pep bought Ederson after failing with other goalkeepers to play his high line, Liverpool did the same with Allison and now Arsenal with their new GK.
The GK pushing up, pushes the defence up where the 6 literally with inverted full backs now participate in 1-2-3-4-1 formation the goal keeper tries to occupy the space the CB’s and the whole back 4 did before, it means you dominate the ball, create intricate patterns of play and eventually over run your opposition. But you have to have two roaming number 8/10 hybrids behind your front three with inverted wide strikers. Your basically making sure you have 10 players to play in these 5 attacking positions. City have Haaland, C Palmer, P Fodden, I Gundogan, B Silva, KDB, Alvaro, Grealish, S Gomez and R Mahrez.

3. Team Goals responsibility, Even the defenders at City contribute because they are much higher up the pitch and spend more time attacking the opposition.

4. united would need 10 players to fill those front 5 positions of equal ability - Right now we have ; Martial, Rashford, Garnaucho, Antony, Sancho, Bruno, Ericsen, Pellistri, Mctominay, Elanga. You might say that you can carry a couple but that means if we keep Rashford, Bruno, Ericsen, Sancho, Garnaucho, Amad and Antony we are 3 top players from being 50% as good as City and maybe as good as Liverpool or Arsenal. If you add Mount, Kaine and R Hojlund and spend £200m you probably still only get 74-79 PL Goals.
 
Red Shorts said:
Out of our current lot, Bruno & Rashford should be getting around 35-40 combined. Kane would be 25-30 on top of that, whereas I would expect a player new to the prem anywhere between 15-25, depending on their quality (ie Osimhen vs Muani).

Sprinkle a few goals amongst the rest (Antony, Garnacho being the next highest) and it is entirely feasible to reach 80.
Click to expand...
I wouldn’t guarantee Fernandes or Rashford getting 20 goals a season unless you are hoping to get a lot of penalties next season
 
You must log in or register to reply here.