RVN was the best striker overall but RVP obviously had the bigger impact for the short time he was with us.
Robin van Persie is the best striker we have ever had in the PL...
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Yes I think that’s a fair summary of the two of them. Ruud’s “striker instinct” was absolutely outstanding, but there was an elegance about Robin that made his goals and all-round play particularly compelling. Watching him defend set-pieces was an added bonus!
The older I get, the harder I find it is to make objective comparisons between players from different eras, even when the years separating them were relatively few. There’s too much “noise” from external factors, not all necessarily football-related, that gets in the way.
Looking at individual seasons, People seem to have forgotten the impact Brian McClair made in his first one: he was the first player to score more than 20 in the league for 20 years. Bringing Hughes back the following year put paid to his days as a prolific scorer, so it’s not really surprising he isn’t highly rated.
If being limited got a player to the point where everytime he had a chance you were certain he'll score, then so be it.
That's how it was for me with Ruud. Almost every chance he got he buried. Other than the Arsenal miss pk (which is one of the footballing moments where it seemed like it was meant to be), there were no "what-if" moments with Ruud.
RVP has a shorter peak (2 years), which can be blamed on injuries, while RVN was considered had probably 4 years. Overall, Ruud was considered as a top striker for a longer period - from 2000 till 2008 roughly. However, Van Persie in 2012-2013 was probably in the top 3 best players in the world (outside Messi and Ronaldo). I don't think Ruud ever reached that height.
His form from like August to February for us in our last title winning season was ridiculous.
Every single goal he scored was either to win us 3 points or for a point.
It's a shame he tailed off a bit after that(and probably cost us vs Real), but he was superlative to watch. My personal favorite individual season from a United player since Ronaldo's 2007-2008 season.
Every single goal he scored was either to win us 3 points or for a point.
It's a shame he tailed off a bit after that(and probably cost us vs Real), but he was superlative to watch. My personal favorite individual season from a United player since Ronaldo's 2007-2008 season.
Gonna give Dwight Yorke some love here. Think he had near enough 30 goals and 20 assists in the treble season.
Granted it fell off very quickly after but if we are talking peaks then few match his. Should have ran away with the balon d'Or in 99 imo.
Granted it fell off very quickly after but if we are talking peaks then few match his. Should have ran away with the balon d'Or in 99 imo.
Is that the penalty where Keown was being a twat? God even I hate Keown for that
Yorke's 98/99 season is a bit underappreciated. Didn't he get 15 assists or something on top of the goals?
It RvN and there's not even a debate.
Him or Beckham. Rivaldo was a great player at NATIONAL LEVEL but not sure he was that good at Barca that season
20 Assists
Yes was going to say the sameVan Nistelrooy was the best striker we've ever had in the league, the guy was a machine.
02/03 Ruud was just
Assist’s didn’t exist in those days. It’s the most over hyped thing in football!
Probably a bit of recency bias, we've had some pretty good strikers over the years. I think an interesting question is who has been our best striker since fergie retired....I'd probably put Ibra's first season as the best we've had followed by Martial's 20+ goal season. Or vice versa
I'd have Ruud, Rooney and Cole ahead of RVP.
With the amount of chances created in the last three games he would have scored half a dozen goalsVan Nistelrooy was the best striker we've ever had in the league, the guy was a machine.
02/03 Ruud was just
No chance. Van Persie is a bit over rated on here. He only played about 100 games.
Only his first season was really good at United right? Kind of sums up his career. An on form injury free Van Persie was amazing, but it didn't happen a lot.
I did so very immensely enjoy his retirement season at Feyenoord. The difference in class between Van Persie and the dudes we have on the field is brilliant. Also why it was so dissappointing Robben didn't manage to get fit for his last season with FC Groningen.
I loved having him here and he was good but he wasn't best we've ever had in the PL good.
It's a bullshit statement but it's certainly generated a lot of conversation.
I'd take Ruud over him no questions asked.
I don’t agree, won the league in 2002/03 because Van Nistelrooy was scoring a goal a game in the run-in and then had an outstanding first season to go with it. United had 89 points the season before Van Persie arrived so it wasn’t like the team rose to another level and he won us the league single handed, it was more that City dropped off by about 15 points.
Ruud was better. So was Rooney. Sorry.
Imo, no one had a first touch that rivals Bergkamp's, the closest is Zidane, and probably Ronaldinho.
so it's unfair to expect RVN, to have the level of Bergkamp in first touch, RVN had an excellent technique overall, not a strong dribbler but his first touch, ball control and shooting technique were world class, hence why he was one of the best strikers in Europe during his stints with MUFC & Madrid.
Yeah I agree, but it's an annoying Dutch trait. If you are not a refined skill and dribbling God you're nothing special. Which is why we never actually win anything, but look amazing doing it.
Fair points. Like I said, Rudy is the better player so don’t disagree with what you have put about his accomplishments. Comparing both arrivals though, just my personal opinion it felt RVP took us to another level, the amount of times he won the game with individual brilliance.
Whereas when Ruud joined us we were already champions and a lot of his goals felt like great team goals rather than Ruud bailing us out. We certainly had a better team when RVN joined as opposed to when RVP joined.
RVP is the most asthetically pleasing footballer I've ever seen play for Man Utd.
To both I raise you Dimitar Berbatov... lacking in some other areas compared to the greats, but his first touch my god it was beautiful.
If there was that at least - but when last did NL actually look amazing!
Yes Berba's ball control was super, Mata as well, but i still think they aren't as good as Bergkamp in terms of first touch.
Bergkamp first touch isn't only about ball control, it included further manipulation which takes his opponent out of the picture and sets himself up for a shot or creates a goal scoring opportunity for a team, all that in his first touch of the ball.
Agreed - considering he came delayed a year after a nasty knee injury he was the most lethal poacher/finisher we’ve had….quite selfish but an absolute machineVan Nistelrooy was the best striker we've ever had in the league, the guy was a machine.
02/03 Ruud was just
Netherlands have many successful players, they are only missing the WC, and tbh only in 1974 they were by far the best team, and end up losing.
You were never winning 1978 WC in Argentina under CIA's dictator Videla, and Spain was the better team in 2010.
Let's not pretend Netherlands is the best team in every WC they play, so if they don't win it's
cause they choked.
That only happened in 1974, and probably in 1978 but the fact that the tournament was tailored by argentinian dictatorship to win under every circumstance changed everything.
That first season though! My word what a striker!
RVP blew my mind more times in the first season he was with us than any other striker I have seen at the club including the likes of Rooney have in their whole careers.
Ruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuud
As a pure #9, Ruud was better than RVP. If you want to talk about forwards as a whole, then Rooney, Ronaldo and Cantona were also better than him.
Ruud and Yorke had better seasons and I don't think it's particularly close. Qualifying it with PL only I suppose there's an argument but overall he falls short of thosr two.
RVP was other worldly from August to Jan and if he kept that form up then yes it would have been him. His form wasn't as strong the second half of the season particularly during the 10 game goal drought. The miss against Madrid still haunts me.
Yorke and Ruud excelled in Europe in a way RVP didn't. Yorke was almost Drogba like for us in the 99 season and while we got knocked out in the CL QF to Madrid in 2003, Ruud was still the top scorer in the competition with 12 goals in 9 games.
By the way anyone calling Ruud just a poacher is clueless and not sure their opinion should be taken serious. Watch his goals against Fulham, West Ham and Arsenal away and Basel that year and still maintain that he was just a poacher. He was in direct competition with Henry so his game always seemed inferior because Henry was a magician but Ruud's holdup play and general game was vastly underrated.
RVP was other worldly from August to Jan and if he kept that form up then yes it would have been him. His form wasn't as strong the second half of the season particularly during the 10 game goal drought. The miss against Madrid still haunts me.
Yorke and Ruud excelled in Europe in a way RVP didn't. Yorke was almost Drogba like for us in the 99 season and while we got knocked out in the CL QF to Madrid in 2003, Ruud was still the top scorer in the competition with 12 goals in 9 games.
By the way anyone calling Ruud just a poacher is clueless and not sure their opinion should be taken serious. Watch his goals against Fulham, West Ham and Arsenal away and Basel that year and still maintain that he was just a poacher. He was in direct competition with Henry so his game always seemed inferior because Henry was a magician but Ruud's holdup play and general game was vastly underrated.
June 13, 2014 around 6pm.
Ultimate recent club example is Ajax giving away a 3 goal aggregate lead in 1 half of football, because even at that stage they have their entire defense on the opponent half.
Never cynical, never just hoof it out and kick all comers.
Yep.
I bet Italian fans never feel quite as nervous about narrow leads in the last 10 mins of a game as Dutch fans do. I mean, they're also nervous, sure; but not with the same kind of 99% certainty that it'll go wrong.
We were atleast as good as anyone in 1990, 1998 and Euro 2000. Especially 1990 was a ridiculous pile of shite from our side.
And Argentina may have been crooked, but Videla was no Jedi so if Rensenbrink hadn't hit the post, we would've won it.
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