Rasmus Højlund | Signed for United

[Valencia Shin Crosses]

I do get Haaland vibes but i worryingly get Nunez vibes too.

Think he's better technically than Nunez. Nunez main issue is that they paid about 25m more than he was worth and made him a marquee signing off the back of a bit of an anomaly season in terms of goal return for Benfica. In reality he's a super raw physical specimen that lacks any sort of consistent technicality, so when the goals turned into BCM this year for Liverpool he couldn't offer much else as a starter.

We also have such a low level to improve upon at striker considering the majority of the year was played with Ronaldo or Weghorst up top. Hojlund would instantly provide a level of danger that defenses didn't have to cope with before.

 

[Member 117152]

I’m expecting this guy to flop hard at least at first.

We are buying potential and no he’ll never be Haaland. Only one of those sadly. I can honestly see this transfer been a dud which is why I’m super unsure.

Maybe for £30m it makes sense as a free hit of sorts but when we are talking double that… I would stay well clear personally.

Muani would be my pick. His all round game looked very strong last season. The problem is our budget seemingly and the reason why we are in for a riskier deal.

Muani and an experienced cheaper striker like Taremi I would be tempted to do if we could let go of Martial.

Instantly we would be strong up top. Both are better footballers than Hojland currently.

 

[Isotope]

Well we sort of have to be in this market. The striker market is incredibly slim pickings right now. The only two probable guarantees in Osimhen and Kane have been priced out. So what do you propose as an alternative? Not buy a striker at all?

Do you believe the strikers market is only Kane, Osinhem, and a young player who is always a sub and never has a season as main striker in his entire career?

 

[Joseunited]

I expect Ten Hag to mould him in to a quality player for United.
Can't wait to get him.

 

[NLunited]

Yes no one predicted Liverpool being so poor and Chelsea struggling to make top half of the table. That doesn’t make us over performers.

Arsenal and Newcastle did better than expected. We overperformed mate.

 

[L1nk]

Do you believe the strikers market is only Kane, Osinhem, and a young player who is always a sub and never has a season as main striker in his entire career?

What are the alternative options then, can you name 5 to 10 of them?

It’s easy to say we should sign others but then not name any alternatives. You also can’t say well thats what our scouts and recruitment are for, because no doubt they’ve looked at many but they seem to have landed on Hojlund, they must have a reason

 

[zaafi]

Do you believe the strikers market is only Kane, Osinhem, and a young player who is always a sub and never has a season as main striker in his entire career?

How is he always a sub, but played most minutes out of Atalanta's strikers? They actually have two decent, experienced strikers in Duvan Zapata and Luis Muriel, so it's a good sign he plays more than them.

Also, please list all of the available strikers that would improve us.

 

[Cathy Ferguson]

Julian Alvarez cost City 17m, didn't he? Is Höjlund really better than him? I dunno. Or are we overpaying for a player who is inferior to mid table strikers such as Watkins and Ferguson, who are not elite? I do not know. Höjlund is certainly exciting but might need 1 or 2 years before he is ready. Is the plan to play Rashford or Martial until then?

 

[Hernandez - BFA]

From his highlights I can also see he’s somewhat of a poacher, at the right place at the right time. Something we’ve missed a lot and with Bruno creating the number of chances he does, it’ll be good to a striker who can get those ugly tap ins

100% - we've lacked someone to poach goals for us. 80% of Haaland's goals is being right place, right time. Pure instinct and cracking positioning. None of our forwards do that.

 

[STYLOISRED]

Julian Alvarez cost City 17m, didn't he? Is Höjlund really better than him? I dunno. Or are we overpaying for a player who is inferior to mid table strikers such as Watkins and Ferguson, who are not elite? I do not know. Höjlund is certainly exciting but might need 1 or 2 years before he is ready. Is the plan to play Rashford or Martial until then?

Do you have a 14mil striker alternative to Hojlund?? If given 50mil could you convince Brighton to sell at the price??

 

[alexthelion]

+1

+2

 

[zaafi]

Julian Alvarez cost City 17m, didn't he? Is Höjlund really better than him? I dunno. Or are we overpaying for a player who is inferior to mid table strikers such as Watkins and Ferguson, who are not elite? I do not know. Höjlund is certainly exciting but might need 1 or 2 years before he is ready. Is the plan to play Rashford or Martial until then?

Luka Jovic cost Real Madrid €60m. Is he better than Alvarez?

Just because you have a single example of a player who went for way below his market value does not mean that's how transfers work.

We're paying mostly for his potential because he's one of the highest rated young strikers. He is not ready to lead the line for us every week, but either way, he is an upgrade on Weghorst. We can't afford Kane or Osimhen, and the rest will be short term solutions, and aren't even that much better than Højlund anyway.

 

[Von Mistelroum]

Julian Alvarez cost City 17m, didn't he? Is Höjlund really better than him? I dunno. Or are we overpaying for a player who is inferior to mid table strikers such as Watkins and Ferguson, who are not elite? I do not know. Höjlund is certainly exciting but might need 1 or 2 years before he is ready. Is the plan to play Rashford or Martial until then?

Hojlund probably won't be up to speed for a season or two in the PL, but he'd surely still be better than those two in that position.

 

[criticalanalysis]

Think this is essential for our striker. Considering we opted for Mount/Bruno midfield combo, the person upfront just has to be someone who can knit the things together and bring others into play. He will also be surrounded with Rashford and Antony on each side with both of them (especially Rashford) being more of a goal threat. With so much goalscoring ability around him, our striker should have this qualities on a relatively high level and if he has that, we can get away with him not having some exceptional output.

Didn't watch Hojlund much, but I assume we think he can develop further in this sense and (if we can get him) will probably share some of his minutes with Martial in the 1st season.

Yes agree, that's why I'm 'fine' with him being 'average' in the aspects I outlined. We were almost playing with 'half' a player on the pitch in an unfit Martial and Weghort most of the time. If we have a fit player just doing the 'basics' well, it'll be a big improvement imo. The issue is what are fans' and the manager's expectations. Personally, I have a 'low' but hopefully realistic bar and if he exceeds that, then brilliant. If people are expecting a prodigy to come in all cylinders blazing then it's only going to be downhill. Also it's great he's left footed! I think the last proper first team CF we had was Saha? Bolds well. In fact, he sort of reminds me of him with his consistent/inconsistent bundle of technique and athleticism.

I've given my assessment above. Hopefully, he improves in the areas where he's currently lacking but untill then, I don't see him as a first choice striker for Manchester United.

Thanks mate, I'm content with those ratings. I think people just need to manage their hopes.

 

[Svartzonker]

Apparently Atalanta is splashing 20 million euros on some striker. Getting him (and Greenwood on loan) to replace Højlund?

This might happen pretty quickly after we wrap up Onana. Would be three sensible moves and many weeks left of the transer window to make smaller tweaks to the squad.

 

[Idxomer]

Hojlund probably won't be up to speed for a season or two in the PL, but he'd surely still be better than those two in that position.

Rashford had 11 goals and 6 assists in 19 games playing as a striker last season. I'm almost sure Hojlund won't deliver better numbers than that.

 

[Isotope]

How is he always a sub, but played most minutes out of Atalanta's strikers? They actually have two decent, experienced strikers in Duvan Zapata and Luis Muriel, so it's a good sign he plays more than them.

Also, please list all of the available strikers that would improve us.

He's on starting XI for 20 games out of 37 games for Atalanta.

You pay me enough, I'll get back to you with the list.

 

[TsuWave]

Julian Alvarez cost City 17m, didn't he? Is Höjlund really better than him?

Hojlund is not better than Alvarez - at least he hasn't shown it yet - that doesn't mean he can't become such though

 

[OrcaFat]

He's on starting XI for 20 games out of 37 games for Atalanta.

You pay me enough, I'll get back to you with the list.

Don’t you think he is any good?

 

[Strelok]

but either way, he is an upgrade on Weghorst.

The bar is a bit too low imo. Especially with the price quoted.

 

[KiD MoYeS]

Julian Alvarez cost City 17m, didn't he? Is Höjlund really better than him? I dunno. Or are we overpaying for a player who is inferior to mid table strikers such as Watkins and Ferguson, who are not elite? I do not know. Höjlund is certainly exciting but might need 1 or 2 years before he is ready. Is the plan to play Rashford or Martial until then?

Does any of this really matter when we are desperate for a striker and the market is very limited.

 

[Isotope]

Don’t you think he is any good?

He has some good points. I mentioned before that he seems good on hold-up the ball and brings others into play. He's hardworker and has good pace.

But, man... why are we making him our main striker with his so little experience? It's not fair for him, and it's not good for us either. There's a Danes poster here who doesn't give him a glowing review about him as our main striker. Most likely because he's not ready yet.

 

[Alemar]

Hojlund probably won't be up to speed for a season or two in the PL, but he'd surely still be better than those two in that position.

Why wouldn’t he be up to speed? All he needs is to find himself in a position to shoot the ball, that’s all. We have enough creativity in this team, Hojlund task will be just to finish

 

[zaafi]

The bar is a bit too low imo. Especially with the price quoted.

Yes, but he isn't just a minor upgrade on him.

We don't know what the price is going to be. It could be a big add on or it could just be £50m straight.

Real Madrid bought a 16 year old Endrick for €35m + €25m add ons.

Barcelona just bought 18 year old Vitor Roque for €30m + €31m in potential add ons.

You gotta pay up for talented young strikers, especially when there's a lack of them in these days.

 

[DSG]

The tweet literally says 'the past decade'. The data from the tweet wasn't mine but from a reliable source but sure let's use your transfermarkt source then. Over 'the last decade' Chelsea have offloaded players to the tune of 1.3billion and we have offloaded 414million worth. Chelsea have so far sold 220m this season. And United? 1m?, last year Chelsea sold 67m of players and United 13m, prior to that it was 148m vs 31m, 57m vs 19m, 157 vs 81 etc etc. I could go on but you get the gist.
We've only cleared 100m once in outgoing players in 11 years. Chelsea regularly do it.

I was chiefly pointing out the inaccuracy of saying Chelsea have 'offloaded very few players' to make your point because it's blatantly untrue. Leaving the stats aside when was the last time you feel United did well in offloading unwanted players? Dan James? And that was such an outlier that the forum still buzzes today about how we wish we could do similarly well on sales. Before Dan James was Lukaku (a high fee close to what we paid for him) and ditto for Angel Maria. We don't sell players we hang onto them till they run their contracts down and leave for zilch, ala Pogba, De Gea etc.

Personally I find that comments like 'Do you understand how accounting works?' are largely trotted out by people doing their best to 'show' they know lots more than they do. Never mind your sarcy "For those of you lapping up what the Glazers tell you..." and "Don't be naive." comments because like all conspiracy theorists arguments they're irrational and based on 'belief' rather than facts. There are enough 'people who understand how accounting works' in the football journalism sphere and even on this forum that will tell you that Man United's FFP concerns are very real, as they are for most teams except City who we know cheat their way through the FFP rules regardless.

Chelsea may well fall foul of FFP, but it won't be due to them 'having offloaded very few players' and trying to argue that our net spends have been similar is nonsense.

Anyway this is all by the by for a Rasmus Hoijland thread. I hope we buy him and have enough money left over from player sales (NOT!) to have a late cheeky bid for Kane to boot

I don’t disagree with you on our track record of moving players on. We’re horrible at it and there’s no need to discuss. Chelsea has been better, but my comment was more about the last season where they spent 600m and still haven’t been sanctioned for FFP.

Regarding FFP, please understand that journalists are looking for stories and headlines that generate clicks. They have sources and those sources are generally at the club. The act of feeding information to these journos may or may not be done to serve a purpose. Is that conspiracy theory or common sense? Secondly, I have enough experience in corporate finance to be fairly confident that we could spend well over our stated budget of 120m and still not be sanctioned for FFP violations. There is not enough transparency in the United financials for anyone to draw any conclusions if you know anything about FFP regulations. In a world where the standards for what passes as “news” is an incredibly low bar, I don’t think that being skeptical about these reports / opinions is out of line.

Lastly, given that we are what, no.3 or no. 4 in the world in club revenue with City, PSG, Chelsea well behind us, Barcelona literally a financial dumpster fire,other than the punishment of Chelsea a few years ago, and knowing that these clubs spend more than us with less revenue, can you come up with any meaningful punishments other than suspended fines (seriously, fines that are suspended — that’s not a joke)? You can’t because they don’t exist. You can literally lose 200m over a 3 year period and still be within FFP!!! When you realize that transfers are amortized over the life of the contract (5 years or in the case of Chelsea, 8 haha!), you can begin to understand how us spending 200m this transfer window will not put us in danger of FFP.

Our spending IS NOT limited by FFP. It’s limited by the Glazers.

 

[NewGlory]

I don't think that should be a problem if Hojlund is managed correctly. You hope for the best but if he is struggling, you can take him out of the firing line and play one of Rashford or Martial in his place. The fact that we've got Garnacho and Sancho as options on the left should give us some flexibility in terms of how we use Rashford as well, so the expectation shouldn't be for Hojlund to carry us in every game.

I imagine the plan will be to go hard on Kane next summer anyway, provided he doesn't sign for anyone else in the interim, so it makes sense to go down the developmental route for whichever striker we sign this summer. We can't keep going for short-term fixes every summer, it's a bit farcical at this point.

Yes, what you are saying is very likely the plan, indeed. The problem, however, is that Rashford is not a striker and Martial cannot play 90 minutes without being injured for the next 3 months. We needed Hojlund and a senior striker and the only reason we are not getting it is - our asshole owners

 

[Sandikan]

I’d take something in between tbf

That's a fair scale to be honest!

 

[Sandikan]

100% - we've lacked someone to poach goals for us. 80% of Haaland's goals is being right place, right time. Pure instinct and cracking positioning. None of our forwards do that.

If we just needed a "poacher" we could have kept Ronaldo, who'd still have scored 15 this season.
We need someone who can do a lot more, like Weigy did, but actually score too.

 

[DSG]

You can't know the exact number, no, but you can make very educated guesses. It's well known what share of wage expenditure tends to go to the players, for instance.

You can call Swiss Ramble and all the other financial experts naive, and shout about how you know better. That's fine. Chelsea are extremely worried about FFP, guess they haven't consulted you.

Chelsea had a net spend of 550m! The aren’t in the CL next season, so that is at the very least 60m less in revenue. We are in the CL next year, our revenue will grow by 45m at least (60-15 for Europa revenues), yet we’re “so close” to breaching FFP? It’s horseshit. The reason we have a cap on spending this transfer window has nothing to do with FFP. It’s 100% the Glazers.

 

[Strelok]

Yes, but he isn't just a minor upgrade on him.

Tbh I don't know if he'd be a big upgrade on WW atm. Maybe in a couple years.

WW could at least keep the ball under pressure most of the time and pass it to another forward. We are not even sure Hojlund could do that here. Lukaku wasn't able to do that here when he was with us. Hojlund doesn't look like a great finisher either. The only thing we could be sure is he's faster than WW.

And I do hope his deal would be structured similarly with those you mentioned. If Atalanta wants 90% as cash we should walk imo. If they do believe in his supposedly huge potential they shouldn't mind the add ons.

 

[DSG]

Tbh I don't know if he'd be a big upgrade on WW atm. Maybe in a couple years.

WW could at least keep the ball under pressure most of the time and pass it to another forward. We are not even sure Hojlund could do that here. Lukaku wasn't able to do that here when he was with us. Hojlund doesn't look like a great finisher either. The only thing we could be sure is he's faster than WW.

And I do hope his deal would be structured similarly with those you mentioned. If Atalanta wants 90% as cash we should walk imo. If they do believe in his supposedly huge potential they shouldn't mind the add ons.

Wout scored 2 goals in 31 appearances. He consistently made the wrong runs in the box, so much so that it clearly frustrated the other attackers and Ten Hag stopped playing him. He was horrible as a finisher. He was decent in hold up play and pressing, but that’s about it.

I’m not sure how good Hojlund would be, but the bar to be better that Wout is incredibly low IMHO.

 

[colombianmancunian]

As some posters have said. The reason we have a cap on our spending this summer has nothing to do with FFP, that’s just journalist BS, the reason we have a cap on our spending is the fecking leeches. If not for them, we would have already tied Onana, Hojlund and would be negotiating for Kane.

 

[macheda14]

As some posters have said. The reason we have a cap on our spending this summer has nothing to do with FFP, that’s just journalist BS, the reason we have a cap on our spending is the fecking leeches. If not for them, we would have already tied Onana, Hojlund and would be negotiating for Kane.

It’s been quite heavily reported that even if Qatar were to buy us this summer we would have had the same issues with our budget. It is FFP.

 

[Bebestation]

Ffp means shit all because ultimately its not illegal

 

[GazTheLegend]

Wout scored 2 goals in 31 appearances. He consistently made the wrong runs in the box, so much so that it clearly frustrated the other attackers and Ten Hag stopped playing him. He was horrible as a finisher. He was decent in hold up play and pressing, but that’s about it.

I’m not sure how good Hojlund would be, but the bar to be better that Wout is incredibly low IMHO.

This, pretty much. Weghorst looked like an amateur player that had won a competition to play up front for Manchester United at times, and we still managed to finish third with him, which was frankly astonishing given quite how bad he really was. It's a low, low bar and I'm not sure what our expectations of Hojlund would be but >2 goals isn't hard to beat.

 

[GazTheLegend]

It’s been quite heavily reported that even if Qatar were to buy us this summer we would have had the same issues with our budget. It is FFP.

That's nonsense. FFP allows something like £30m owner investment to cover a club. The Glazers have put in .... 0. If Sheikh Jassim bought us, you can safely assume that our owner investment would be,... well, more than zero at least. It's not hard to do more than the Glazers.

Edit: interestingly, the Premier League has completely different figures related to losses when compared with UEFA. UEFA allow 30m euro owner investment, the Premier League allow for £80m losses year on year. So there's a discrepancy there.

 

[colombianmancunian]

It’s been quite heavily reported that even if Qatar were to buy us this summer we would have had the same issues with our budget. It is FFP.

It’s just media gossip man.

 

[Strelok]

Wout scored 2 goals in 31 appearances. He consistently made the wrong runs in the box, so much so that it clearly frustrated the other attackers and Ten Hag stopped playing him. He was horrible as a finisher. He was decent in hold up play and pressing, but that’s about it.

I’m not sure how good Hojlund would be, but the bar to be better that Wout is incredibly low IMHO.

Agree that's low I said that as well. But thing is he's only 19 yo and he did scored some in the Serie A. Lukaku scored loads there too.

I'm not saying it's impossible for him to hit the ground running here or he won't be able to make it here. That's too daft. It's simply impossible to be sure what would happen. But we should trust ETH I think. However as none could be half sure about anything imo the deal should be structured with a decent fee and lot of add ons. And the wages should be also decent only so if things go tits up we won't be stuck with another Sancho.

 

[OrcaFat]

He has some good points. I mentioned before that he seems good on hold-up the ball and brings others into play. He's hardworker and has good pace.

But, man... why are we making him our main striker with his so little experience? It's not fair for him, and it's not good for us either. There's a Danes poster here who doesn't give him a glowing review about him as our main striker. Most likely because he's not ready yet.

I appreciate what you’re saying but I think you’re, maybe, applying a perspective that isn’t really followed by EtH. I don’t think we are making him our main striker. Quite possibly there is an expectation that he will perform well enough to be selected but that’s as far as it goes.

It’s not huge money for a player with uncommon talent and with the prospect of great improvement. He’s one for now and the future.

Generally, the EtH approach is to assemble a squad where there is as much quality as possible and, specifically, true competition for first 11 places. So Hojlund will be expected to compete but not necessarily be selected in the majority of games in his first year.

When we look at the rest of the squad, we arguably need two new strikers, regardless of how good the first new striker is.

 

[Apokalips]

Going into next season with this kid as our sole #9 would be madness, regardless of how good he may become.

I would be shocked if we didn't bring in at least one additional goalscoring forward with more experience and proven record alongside this.