Gotta say I am surprised by the early criticism considering just three weeks ago most of people here were happy with this transfer despite never seeing him play before that, which itself was very weird because his record was really questionable and we needed someone better than Hojlund.
11
Season Average Rating
- Appearances
- 25
- Goals
- 4
- Assists
- 2
- Yellow cards
- 1
He's not good enough at this level.
Wumming like this is so fecking tedious.
Plays his first 90 minutes of PL without a pre-season for a pathetic, uncoached team against one of the best teams in England and you come out with shit like that. You would have hated Vidic and Evra in their first season.
Felt like a bit of a baptism of fire, making his first start against Konate and Van Dijk. He did ok in parts and made some nice passes here and there but you can see that coming from Bologna, this is a big step up for him. The game at times was too fast and physical for him to handle and he’s going to have to adapt if he’s to be a success. He’s a young player who has something about him so we will invest that time to build him up.
He probably would also have done a little better if Bruno hadn't booted it at him from odd angles on the few times he did actually choose to pass to him.
Zirkzee played about 8 minutes in the entire Euros I think.
For the price paid, it will be a rip off
Y
He is not good enough and I have seen enough of him.
Yes I said what I said, we would never win the league with player like this.
He is not good enough and I have seen enough of him.
On yesterday’s performance and the positions he was taking up, we’ve basically replaced McTominay with a slower version of himself at a net cost of £15m. I suspect that his role yesterday may have been dictated by ten Hag, so it’ll be interesting to see how he does over the next couple of weeks and whether that changes.
IIRC, for his goal he and McTom we’re both in the exact same position and McTom would have put it away if Zirkzee hadn’t been on the pitch.
The positions he took up yesterday is how he plays as a striker. He's effectively a false 9. Mct never really played that role for us, the majority of the time Rasmus was playing up top or another striker and he was arriving in the box from deep.
Apart from their height they are completely different players. I'm not going to judge Zirkzee's performance yesterday as it was his first start and vs pool, although based on his appearances he does need to either get match fit or get used to the speed of the league. Whilst his passing was off I think we have seen from the appearances and how he played for Bologna that he is technically better than Mct.
I genuinely hope so, because that was not evident yesterday.
As for the rest of it, I’d argue the false 9/10 was exactly the role Scott was being brought on to play for the majority of last season, that Hojlund was also on the pitch some of the time playing a 9 role, is neither here nor there. I’m not referencing his earlier career roles as a false DM.
He didn't look up to it yesterday, you could just read it on his face. As a second choice option I'm sure he'll be fine.
The false nine role when you've got wingers incredibly wide and midfielders covered doesn't make a lot of sense. You need to be surrounded with quick options or have the technical skills to beat your man.
The false nine role when you've got wingers incredibly wide and midfielders covered doesn't make a lot of sense. You need to be surrounded with quick options or have the technical skills to beat your man.
Mct would come on as a 10 or an 8 that bombed forward and every now and then as a second striker going up top. If he was playing as a false 9 Mct would have been up top as a 9 on his own and then dropping deeper getting involved in play and linking up with the wingers, which he wasn't doing even when he was brought on as a sub. Even with the semantics out of the way Zirkzee plays that role as the lone striker, I don't think we have ever seen Mct play up top by himself in a Firmino type role which is effectively how Zirkzee plays . Its 2 completely different roles they are/were being asked to do.
Also its pretty clear Zirkzee has been bought to challenge/back up Rasmus not as a replacement for Mctominay.
This exactly. Thought it was a mixed bag from him, got into a few good positions to score which is a good sign but missed the chances.
Played some nice passes on a few occasions but in the first part of the game was waiting on the ball coming to him, not protecting the ball and losing out.
Shouldn't be too harshly judged when our attack saw so little of the ball anyway. Definitely think he has something about him.
Better players suffered yesterday. He looks ok, its hard against Liverpool as his first game. The next manager with reasonable tactics will make things easier for him.
Presume this is a joke. You've heard of people like Van Persie and Ruud Van Nistelrooy i presume? Suarez also came to the PL from the dutch league
Anyway, on Zirkzee the ONLY thing making me not give up on him already is that he's managed to get a couple of chances so his movement around the box seems decent.
Outside of that he seems quite slow and clumsy to me and I don't really see it. if I had to bet my house I'd say he will end up more Anthony or Van De Beek than Van Nistelrooy. i think this will be yet another poor signing by ETH.
Looks far too lightweight and a bit scared of the physicality of the league. Very early days though.
Seen enough in 90mins
Hojlund started banging them in a few months into his first season here. Have some patience
Bookmarked just in case.
In recent times.
You’re naming players that haven’t played in this league for 10yrs or more. Where are the recent examples?
To early to judge him,has good movement but unable to hold a ball,he will need some time to catch up with the pace and physicality of PL
Just like Hojland, a casualty of ten Hag's awful tactics.
You could say that about pretty much every nationality as 10 years is no sample size. Who was the last top German, Spanish or Italian striker signed in the PL?
We had these posts about Rasmus too. They were wrong then and this is wrong now.
Germany - Sane, Podolski, Havertz, Schurrle, Ozil
Spain - Pedro, Mata, Deulofeu, Llorente, Rodrigo Alcantara, Ayoze Perez
The Italians have never really performed in the PL and that’s across all positions. Their list of underperformers or players that stay for a season and leave is probably the most.
So no you can’t say that for every major nationality that has a sizeable number of players in the PL across that period.
How many of those are strikers? One or two at a push? None of whom have been particularly successful.
Unfair to criticise Zirkzee. Hasn’t played regular football in months due to injury and euros causing him to miss preseason. It’s a massive step up in intensity from serie A and this was his first start against one of the best pressing teams in Europe. And the rest of our team were shit.
He gets a total free pass from me.
He gets a total free pass from me.
My question was about forwards, it wasn’t limited to strikers.
Success is relative. You don’t have to be a star to be successful in this league. Ayoze Perez for example was a proven and successful player in the PL.
He was shite but he didn't have a pre-season and it was his first start of the season. That said, his goal record at previous clubs was concerning (similar concerns with Hojlund). I'll reserve judgement for now anyway as he still needs to settle - I never had high expectations, so I'm okay as long as he proves himself to be a good no.2 striker. His fee and goal record indicates we shouldn't really be expecting much more than that.
Höjlund is overrated and inferior to someone like Isak. Too early to tell on Zirkzee but he missed two great chances yesterday and he doesn't have a great record from an inferior league.
Rasmus hasn't done anything noteworthy, let's be honest. He's been very average. Not bad enough to be sold after 1 season, but not good enough that I'm falling off my chair in pure wonder at his talent either
Shouldn't be in a position where he's our go to No 9 because our actual No 9, who is also massively inconsistent (and overrated, IMO) is unavailable.
Missed a couple of decent chances yesterday, but I wouldn't bet my life savings on Rasmus popping those away either.
Missed a couple of decent chances yesterday, but I wouldn't bet my life savings on Rasmus popping those away either.
Kudos for being at the end of those two crosses, but should have scored and he was not as good on the ball as in his cameos. He was not the only one in our attack that seemed out of tune with his teammates, but it was very visible that he needs more time with Bruno, Nacho, Rashford and Amad to get tuned in because it was a mess every time we tried to move fast on the breaks.
Far too early to judge on just the one start but what was worrying for me wasn't just the 2 chances he missed but the amount of times he either lost the ball or gave it away to the opposition. I really hope this was just a case of nerves or settling down because he will need to do a lot better in future.
hows he ever going to get 'tuned' in with Bruno, who is just as likely to smash it him at chest height with a volleyed backheel from 5 yards out, or send if 50 yards away with the outside of his wrong foot, for him to chase. Nacho aint passing to no one unless hes completely crowded out and then its too late, rash is struggling to tie his shoelaces, and amad is well a work in progress.
Rasmus is aqtually very consistent in his finishing. His biggest area for improvement is getting on the end of chances often enough.
Zirkzee has done well to get to five decent opportunities in less than two games worth of playing time, with new team mates. His first finish was very cool, the next four situations have been less perfect.
Both are toung strikers with much scope for development.
We need to give him at least six months to find his feet. It’s a big step up.
That said, I agree he looked WELL off the pace yesterday.
That said, I agree he looked WELL off the pace yesterday.
I'll give him a pass as he's still clearly not yet comfortable.
He was all over the place, he had a bad game but he deserves some time to adapt.
Does that prevent him winning headers?