Rasmus Hojlund image 9

Rasmus Hojlund Denmark flag

2024-25 Performances

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5.2 Season Average Rating
Appearances
22
Goals
7
Assists
1
Yellow cards
1
Red Star One said:
Center-forwards transfers in the Premier League since summer 2023 (in euros, only those above 15m)

Havertz to Arsenal - 75m
Joao Pedro to Brighton - 32m
Nkunku to Chelsea - 60m
Jackson to Chelsea - 37m
Beto to Everton - 25m
Hojlund to United - 74m
Wood to Forest - 17m
Archer to Sheffield - 21m / back to Villa - 18m / off to Soton - 17m
Cunha to Wolves - 50m
Evanilson to Bournemouth - 37m
Unai to Bournemouth - 16m
Igor Thiago to Brentford - 33m
Rutter to Brighton - 46m
Nketiah to Palace - 29m
Delap to Ipswich - 18m
Zirkzee to United - 43m
Solanke to Spurs - 65m
Fullkrug to West Ham - 27m

Truth be told and trying to be objective, I don't know if there's a single team in the league that did a worse piece of business than us. We can complain about shortage of strikers and pretend there are none on the market, but even on this list you will find a lot of players that were potentially attainable by United, but went to another club.
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Why do we always overspend?!?!?!
 
If you look at his league performances only, he's been dogshit for about 90% of the games he's had here. It's the worst attack we've ever had and it's only fitting he's the lead striker for this team, he's just as bad if not worse than the wide players.

Amazes me how anyone can watch him and see a top talent. He's a £15m player who should probably be on loan at Las Palmas right now.

I've said many times in here but the best thing he has going for him right now is that Zirkzee is here to take all the negative attention off him.
 
El Jefe said:
If you look at his league performances only, he's been dogshit for about 90% of the games he's had here. It's the worst attack we've ever had and it's only fitting he's the lead striker for this team, he's just as bad if not worse than the wide players.

Amazes me how anyone can watch him and see a top talent. He's a £15m player who should probably be on loan at Las Palmas right now.

I've said many times in here but the best thing he has going for him right now is that Zirkzee is here to take all the negative attention off him.
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The zirkzee comment is spot on
 
I highly doubt this guy would be at this club if it weren't for Haaland. Being close to signing, but just missing out just made the club desperate to not miss out on the "new Haaland". A young, tall, blond, left-legged scandinavian that was scoring a few goals against the likes of Kazahkstan at the same time Haaland was setting new records totally fecked us over with the transfer fee as we were absolutely desperate. It is laughable, really.
 
Dinghy said:
I highly doubt this guy would be at this club if it weren't for Haaland. Being close to signing, but just missing out just made the club desperate to not miss out on the "new Haaland". A young, tall, blond, left-legged scandinavian that was scoring a few goals against the likes of Kazahkstan at the same time Haaland was setting new records totally fecked us over with the transfer fee as we were absolutely desperate. It is laughable, really.
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It’s a bit much claiming it’s laughable when the scenario seems to be largely a product of your imagination
 
jem said:
It’s a bit much claiming it’s laughable when the scenario seems to be largely a product of your imagination
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My imagination >> Rasmus Højlund 70 mill+ elite talent
 
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El Jefe said:
If you look at his league performances only, he's been dogshit for about 90% of the games he's had here. It's the worst attack we've ever had and it's only fitting he's the lead striker for this team, he's just as bad if not worse than the wide players.

Amazes me how anyone can watch him and see a top talent. He's a £15m player who should probably be on loan at Las Palmas right now.

I've said many times in here but the best thing he has going for him right now is that Zirkzee is here to take all the negative attention off him.
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This is sad but very true.
 
He looks a 20-30m talent most of the time. The touch, close control, intelligent movement, aerial ability and goal threat just isn’t there, based on what we’ve seen so far. What we have seen is one good CL run and otherwise, spurts of goals here and there.

I did think that he looked a talent based on the few clips of his time at his previous club. But that’s a terrible basis anyway. At United, sadly he hasn’t really shown much to be thought of as a big talent. He spends most games wrestling with defenders and struggling to show any individual quality. With some players they have obvious albeit raw talent and then it’s up to them and the club to develop it - I don’t think that’s the case here.

Hopefully he’ll turn it around and show us his talent soon but atm he looks like the kind of striker who should be behind the two main strikers hoping for a game in cup games or as a sub.
 
Mike Smalling said:
Are you at least open to the idea that Højlund also has to go against PL defenders, whereas Hugill is going up against defenders no one has ever heard of?
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The funny thing is Hojlund played against Wigan last season in the FA Cup against defenders no one has heard of and didn't do anything
Gandalf said:
League One is not the Sunday League no matter how many times you say it and continuing to repeat that line betrays your ignorance of the game, but leaving that aside it surely says something that the coaching staff at this supposed Sunday League side he is playing for have not given him a start since October and are supposedly considering terminating the loan in January.

Your analysis of the goals Rasmus has scored conveniently left out the Champions League where he scored a brace against those well known minnows Bayern Munich last season, he also scored against Villa, Newcastle and Brighton last year who are not exactly the mid table duffers you seem to think he only scores against.

I am totally ok with the idea that Rasmus has flaws in his game, I see them just as others do but sadly he has been terribly coached for the last 18 months as evidenced by the fact that the coaches in question were sacked. I genuinely believe he should not be our first choice striker right now but understudying someone else and that is a direct failing of the club who overpaid and had no real strategy for his development when they knew they were not buying the finished article.

I am not ok with the notion that Hugill is better because it is a fantasy that exists in your mind alone. You have no monopoly on watching Academy games and nobody is identifying Joe as a future first team player here. More to the point professional coaches from pretty much every club in the football pyramid will be aware of him and will also know that we would probably bite their hand off if they offered us just a nominal fee for him and yet not one of them has done so. I am going to assume that professional scouts and coaches are better judges than you and their judgement seems to be that Hugill might just have a career in the lower leagues if he can improve on what he is currently offering but right now he looks to be headed on the same trajectory as D'Mani Mellor.
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Yeah he scored against Bayern, the rest of his CL goals were against Copahagan and Galatarasy and wow he scored against Villa Brighton and Newcastle amazing, definitely a world beater. And for Denmark?

So now the coaches are the problem? Wasn't everyone singing in the summer how Ruud was going to save and transform Hojlund and turn him into a beast? Then it was moved on to Amorim, the narrative was he turned gyokeres into a world beater then he was going to work his magic with Hojlund?

And to bring up our scouts as evidence that they are the best judges of talent is ludicrous. Consider this is the same club which apparently scouted over 804 right backs and the best they could come up with was Wan Bissaka. The same coaches and scouts who let go Angel Gomes, Kovar, Elanga and alvaro Fernandez for peanuts who are proving to be better players than the ones we have available. I mean our scouts are so good and iron clad, ETH demanded he had veto over them before signing as Manager here.

With regards to Hugil you can call it fantasy based on numbers, but watching him as a footballer there really isn't any disputing that he displays better attributes as a footballer than Hojlund and I stand by that if he had been given the same amount of games and chances Hojlund has had he'd have similar or better performances and numbers. It's not really a stretch to believe any other competent striker could achieve more than 2 premiership goals in over 14 games is it

That's not me claiming hugil is good enough or should be with us starting or playing for Manchester United, it just highlights how poor Hojlund is as he really doesn't offer anything besides finishing and workrate and a lot of pointless passion which turns a lot of fans on. I was shot down for claiming Chris Wood was a better striker than Hojlund then a few weeks later I noticed after we played Forrest there was posters saying how Chris Wood would do better.

I mean we have a striker who is useless aerially, can barely trap and control a football ,, has no idea how to create chances for himself or when to time runs and be a nuisance in the box, is built like a brick wall but goes down more times than a cheap hooker and you think that the idea that there isn't championship and league one strikers who are better, that's what you call fantasy my friend. Just because a player has a fancy name, looks the part and wears the red shirt with an iconic number, it doesn't qualify them as being great or having world class ability and potential
 
you better have great stats when you're this type of striker, and he doesn't. he is also not providing some tactical advantage where you can say he's doing more important things on the pitch than scoring, like Heskey under Capello.

even the fact he's only 22 doesn't mean much. to trully talented players everything comes naturally and you can see it even in their teen years. for those less talented we keep saying they have time on their side, but how often do they actually improve to that degree?

in 2 years, he will be the same basic striker he is now, but more experienced. which is fine when you're Dzeko who was scoring for fun at his age. Hojlund is still learning how to control the ball.

you need 16-17 league goals every season to be considered success playing that way.
 
Hojlund is strong, tall, combative and fast. He has the right ingredients to be scoring goals on a regular basis.
 
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The Serpent said:
The funny thing is Hojlund played against Wigan last season in the FA Cup against defenders no one has heard of and didn't do anything
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Yes, one game famously proves everything. If you think Joe Hugill would do as well, or better, that's fine. I don't - there is simply no evidence for it. It also doesn't really matter. I think virtually everyone now agrees that Højlund isn't good enough for us now, and that we massively overpaid for him. Only things that can really be discussed now is who we start for the rest of the season, assuming we don't buy a striker in January, and whether he is worth keeping as back-up next year.

And I still haven't seen anyone claim that he should be our main striker going forward, because he had a good shot or whatever, which it what you claimed.
 
Captmfla said:
Hojlund is strong, tall, combative and fast. He has the right ingredients to be scoring goals on a regular basis.
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Why has the notion he is strong become legion? He is not.

As for being fast, it really doesn’t look like it, but then again, he is so preoccupied with wrestling CB’s that we rarely see him display pace.
 
He is fast but the pointless kind of fast where he needs 40 yards of green to gallop into to hit top speed.

Acceleration is far more important than top speed in football. Being quick off the mark is how a striker nips in front of a defender to receive a ball or tap one in.
 
Fortitude said:
Why has the notion he is strong become legion? He is not.

As for being fast, it really doesn’t look like it, but then again, he is so preoccupied with wrestling CB’s that we rarely see him display pace.
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I said this yesterday, almost looks like he's lost a bit of pace already, but someone made a good point that he's fast when he gets going into space, but lacks the initial instant burst of pace to get into it.

A bit like a steam train, great when it's up to full speed, but useless as a getaway vehicle, which is what you need to break free from defenders when you're player like he is.
 
Fortitude said:
Why has the notion he is strong become legion? He is not.

As for being fast, it really doesn’t look like it, but then again, he is so preoccupied with wrestling CB’s that we rarely see him display pace.
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He is probably strong in the conventional sense, like he can lift heavy weights in the gym. But in football, it just means so little if you can't use it properly, which he can't. It looks like he doesn't have the balance for it.
 
I maintain Hojlund has potential to be a very good striker. He has lots of the raw attributes.

Plenty of strikers don't refine their game and up their goal tally until their mid 20s.

Problem is he shouldn't have been a starting CF for a team who expects top 4. The expectation and pressure may halt his progress, especially in a dysfunctional side.
 
Trequarista10 said:
I maintain Hojlund has potential to be a very good striker. He has lots of the raw attributes.

Plenty of strikers don't refine their game and up their goal tally until their mid 20s.

Problem is he shouldn't have been a starting CF for a team who expects top 4. The expectation and pressure may halt his progress, especially in a dysfunctional side.
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Yeah, the caf’s just doing its usual thing where a few bad results means every player should be sent to the glue factory.

Hojlund has had a couple of hot streaks where he looks like a legitimately very good young striker. He’s scored a range of quality goals and when he’s full of confidence his all round game goes up a notch as well. Plus his record in Europe speaks for itself.

Unfortunately for us, he is massively undercooked for the role of number 9 at Manchester United (or, indeed, any PL club) He’s an interesting prospect who might be class by the time he’s in his mid twenties. Managing that development will be very difficult though. And the first step involves urgently finding an older/better striker to share the load.
 
superdry said:
Plenty of skill apart from the ability to hold a ball up and stay on his feet
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He holds up the ball well enough but I think he always has the ball trapped under his feet. I very rarely see him able to quickly get the ball out from under him, which makes it so awkward to watch. Something isnt right with that style.

A very good finisher and works hard, but he needs a lot of refining. Its not his fault too, he shouldn't ideally be an understudy.
 
Is there an all round forward out there with mobility and technical ability who can play the 9? The links with Osimhen, a forward with mediocre ability with back to goal and erratic technical skills would mean another one dimensional striker being brought in.

Hojlund's potential is often discussed, his first touch puts heavy restrictions on his growth, he has shown moments of quality in that aspect but too often he needs 3/4/5 touches to get the ball where he wants it in general play, which is major part of the overall attacking dysfunction. Looking on FBREF he is in the bottom 1 percentile for shots per 90 over the last year compared to forwards, bottom 7 percentile for touches in the box against forwards, bottom 11% for touches overall against forwards, wins 27% of his aerial duels. He is a good finisher but there is very little else that you can point to as a current strength in his game.
 
I think Rasmus has something, I think he could be a good player but he needs to completely change his style of play and the way he thinks about the game.

He automatically, no matter the situation, seems to always back into defenders or be wrestling with someone. It's like he's got in his head he's this target man type striker and all he's ever trying to do is back into someone, in attempt to out muscle them, rather than simply dropping off into space or making runs into the box. He's almost never in space and is almost always attached to a defender having a hugging match with them. It's baffling to watch.

When he does rarely get running and gets near to the goal, or finds space, I think he looks like an ok player, he just almost never gets into those positions because of the way he plays.
 
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He's a poor all round player, it's got nothing to do with how old he is, Liam Delap is exactly the same age but his ability to hold up, drop into play and understanding of movement puts him in a different class to Hojlund.

Alongside Garnacho it's a collection of attacking players with no footballing intelligence and very low game IQ. I can't think of one premier league outfit where Rasmus could play on a regular basis even amongst the relegation placed teams. We need reminding that he scored 9 goals before his move, these are similar numbers to Rashford in his unmotivated, disinterested and lazy phases in a tougher league environment, this isn't a scenario where the club have signed some outstanding talent where time will guarantee a return on performance levels.

He shouldn't be anywhere near the first team, as said he needs a sequence of consecutive loans where he does well enough to either be sold or become a squad player.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Yeah, the caf’s just doing its usual thing where a few bad results means every player should be sent to the glue factory.

Hojlund has had a couple of hot streaks where he looks like a legitimately very good young striker. He’s scored a range of quality goals and when he’s full of confidence his all round game goes up a notch as well. Plus his record in Europe speaks for itself.

Unfortunately for us, he is massively undercooked for the role of number 9 at Manchester United (or, indeed, any PL club) He’s an interesting prospect who might be class by the time he’s in his mid twenties. Managing that development will be very difficult though. And the first step involves urgently finding an older/better striker to share the load.
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You’ve said it better than I could.
 
Really could do with a stint on loan at somewhere like a Leeds/Sunderland level, like Amad did.

Needs to get lots of game time and confidence.

There is plenty of raw talent there but that will not come to fruition in a struggling Utd team severely under the microscope.

As for the fee, not his fault but outrageous for a potential. Sums up the ETH signings era.
 
Feel like people see his size and expect him to play a certain way, when that isn't what he is. We've seen him be something good during our European run that onana was on a mission to torpedo. Just wish we would stop playing the ball to him like he is some sort of beast at holding the ball up due to his size as that doesn't really play to his strengths
 
FerociousCorgis said:
Feel like people see his size and expect him to play a certain way, when that isn't what he is. We've seen him be something good during our European run that onana was on a mission to torpedo. Just wish we would stop playing the ball to him like he is some sort of beast at holding the ball up due to his size as that doesn't really play to his strengths
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What are his strengths? Not trying to be an ass but outside of creating chances for him how do Utd bring value out of his all round game on a consistent basis.
 
I still think there's a good player in there, but he shouldn't be doing his learning in the harsh light of being Man Utd's full-time number 9. The Newcastle game brutally exposed how challenging the basics of top-level centre forward play are for him at the moment.
 
Overpaying is not only bad business practice, it also kills the player! if they don’t turn up at and start banging them in regularly.

Fans will always mention the transfer fee, even if personally I don’t like to give it much attention as it’s more about the negotiation between 2 clubs, more than just a valuation of the players talent.
 
FerociousCorgis said:
Feel like people see his size and expect him to play a certain way, when that isn't what he is. We've seen him be something good during our European run that onana was on a mission to torpedo. Just wish we would stop playing the ball to him like he is some sort of beast at holding the ball up due to his size as that doesn't really play to his strengths
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Distinctly remember Amorim instructing Hojlund to try curving his run away from and behind the defender. Did he? Hardly.

You can't pass into space when your striker's first instinct is to get touch-tight to the defender at every opportunity.
 
This is such an extraordinary active thread compared to most, safe to say, No.9 at United is one of the hardest positions in football.

I maintain he's got some qualities than in a less insane environment, could be refined and shine through.

He is undeniably a long way off what we need in a peak CF. I think the calls for us to recruit a more experienced one and have him as a backup are reasonable, but those that say he's got nothing are throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Let him be an impact sub and cup player for a year or two and take him out of the firing line and he'll look 5x better.

I hope we can eventually create an environment that he can thrive in.
 
Captmfla said:
Hojlund is strong, tall, combative and fast. He has the right ingredients to be scoring goals on a regular basis.
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None of those things make you a goalscorer. He just needs to be in the right place - then use those things to help him get on the end of balls into the box. He could be small and slow and still score goals if his positional play and reactions were good enough.
 
IMO he is worse than Zirkzee, don't see anything from apart from backing into players and ending up on grass.

Nowhere near United quality. Our left side (LWB, L10) and striker are non existent.
 
I really like Højlund. Unfortunately, like many of our recent signings, he’s being judged based on his price tag, which I think is unfair. He’s only 21, in just his second season with United, and playing in a team that struggles to, not create chances but to perform as a team. Sure, some might argue he needs to do more to get into better positions, but the lack of goals from our strikers has been a recurring issue for some time now. Can we really place all the blame on the striker? I don’t think so.

That said, I’ll admit Højlund probably shouldn’t be our starting striker at this stage of his career. Hes still quite raw in certain aspects of his game, but I firmly believe he has the potential and tools to become a top-class striker with time and the right support. It’s about patience and giving him the platform to grow.

Unfortunately, United hasn’t been the best platform for young players to develop in recent years. Instead of fostering their growth, we often seem to hinder their potential. Whether it’s due to inconsistent management, a lack of clear direction, or the pressure to deliver immediate results, the environment hasn’t been conducive to nurturing talent. Young players need stability, a clear plan, and a team built to complement their strengths—things that have been in short supply at the club.
 
It was an unfortunate decision by United to ask more of Hojlund than he is able to deliver. Another daft transfer decision, like so many others during the post-Ferguson era, where we either brought in a player who was clearly not up to the required standard or who was well past their peak.
 
RuudTom83 said:
Overpaying is not only bad business practice, it also kills the player! if they don’t turn up at and start banging them in regularly.

Fans will always mention the transfer fee, even if personally I don’t like to give it much attention as it’s more about the negotiation between 2 clubs, more than just a valuation of the players talent.
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And in this case I think a key point is that he had been bought by Atalanta just 12 month earlier for €17m.

If he was a player we had identified and picked up at that time for around that price when we notionally had Ronaldo and Martial as more senior strikers ahead of him, the narrative would be different and there'd have been far less risk tied to the whole deal.

Instead 12 months and 10 goals later we were spending €73m on him to be our main CF. Our scouts must have seen a hell of a lot in him in that 12 months that they failed to see before....
 
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