Rival watch

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So apparently City don't have a 'striker', I would like to ask where the likes of Jesus, Mahrez, Sterling, Foden, Grealish, and Torres play? Add in the likes of De Bruyne, Bernardo Silva and Gundogan and I would suggest that they are well stocked with players who score goals, surely this is the primary role of a striker?

Along similar lines are Salah and Mane strikers? The best 2 teams in the country play in a way currently that doesn't need the traditional target man central striker, but to suggest that any of these players are not forwards/strikers is a slight misnomer, I agree with PS that Son would also come into this category of forward too (Bergwijn would like to!) along with the likes of Mount, Pulisic, Havertz, at Chelsea, Benrahma, and Bowen at The Spammers and even Rashford and Sancho at United.
 
KingHotspur said:
If you have a budget then yeah Klopp all day long. He’s grown as a manager and made Liverpool into one into the best teams in the world. He won’t ever take another job like though, now he’s at the level of Pep, he will only take huge club jobs like Barca, Madrid or Munich or the national team Germany.

But if you’re one of the biggest clubs in the world and money is no object then I’d still go for Pep over anyone else about.
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See I wouldn’t, I’d 100% go for Klopp.

I think Klopp has shown he exceeds expectations whereas Pep meets them. Both are great managers and play two different yet fantastic brands of football but if Klopp has done all his at clubs who weren’t already the best and who didn’t have unlimited finances then I think it could be scary what he could do with a blank cheque.

Realistically you're never gonna say no to either manager though but if there were ever a situation where I could pick one, I’d definitely go with Klopp.
 
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The Changing Man said:
So apparently City don't have a 'striker', I would like to ask where the likes of Jesus, Mahrez, Sterling, Foden, Grealish, and Torres play? Add in the likes of De Bruyne, Bernardo Silva and Gundogan and I would suggest that they are well stocked with players who score goals, surely this is the primary role of a striker?
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Yes and no. All strikers should be goalscorers but not all goalscorers should be strikers. It’s generally understood that a striker (of any style, could be a Vardy/Defoe type or a Lukaku/Kane type) should provide a focal point for the team, a point of reference. They can do this by acting as a physical presence, being a pivot for other forward, potentially dropping off to play in others, or they can do this by occupying CBs with their movement and pace and stretching the game through the middle for other teammates.

Few of those City players do that, Jesus is the only one who really plays centrally as a 9 and I don’t think he pulls up many trees. The likes of KDB, Torres, maybe Gundogan can play false 9 but that’s a different kettle of fish to what is generally understood as a striker, so I wouldn’t count it as such. It also demands a lot more of the team around the player.

I don’t think all goalscorers have to play centrally and I think the conundrum a lot of coaches face is whether to play with a sub-par 9 or to try and coach a difficult style that requires very specific attributes and footballing intelligence that not many have (false 9). I personally don’t think playing players out of position is a good thing but I know others disagree (eg Son as a striker) and tbh it’s highly circumstantial as to when you’d want to do that and not.
 
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Strikers and forwards are actually different.

A striker in most cases is essentially the team’s main goal outlet who is simply in the side to score goals and nothing else, they’re regarded as the player closest to the opposition goal and play in and around the penalty area.

A forward covers any player that plays in the attacking line (left, central, right) but is required to be part of the build up play as well as getting in on the goals. The centre forward can be a bit of a sticky point though as there aren’t too many in today’s game but Firmino would be one of the best examples of a centre forward and not a striker.

In Spurs’ case; Son, Lucas and Bergwijn are forwards but not strikers (Son can cover the striker role in times of need), just as Lamela and Chadli were too. Kane is a striker but not a forward, just as Janssen, Llorente and Vinicius were our backup strikers, not backup forwards.
 
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Dier Hard said:
In Spurs’ case; Son, Lucas and Bergwijn are forwards but not strikers (Son can cover the striker role in times of need), just as Lamela and Chadli were too. Kane is a striker but not a forward, just as Janssen, Llorente and Vinicius were our backup strikers, not backup forwards.
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In Harrys case I would say the same as Sonny in reverse he is very definitely a striker, but he can play as a forward if required and if we had another decent option to play as the striker his ability to supply could be used occasionally as an option not that we want to be doing it all the time.
 
The Changing Man said:
In Harrys case I would say the same as Sonny in reverse he is very definitely a striker, but he can play as a forward if required and if we had another decent option to play as the striker his ability to supply could be used occasionally as an option not that we want to be doing it all the time.
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Yeah that’s true he can play as a centre forward but I think long term it’d be a waste. I doubt we’ll get a better finisher than Kane for the next 30+ years (if that) and so I wouldn’t wanna take him away from what he does best. We definitely need another striker regardless but I’d say we’re better off trying to get an Eriksen type to fully unleash Kane (and Son) rather than ask Kane to basically play like Eriksen and have another striker who likely won’t be as good take Kane’s spot further up.
 
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Dier Hard said:
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He's been great for them and a top PL striker, no doubt about it...

...but as a Spurs man, he really exists in relation to 2 incidents.

There's this...

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...and being half a yard offside for this...

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Thanks, Sergio.
 
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Leeds getting slaughtered highlights:
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I wonder if Bielsa's going to walk? He's already been there longer than in any other job.
 
Dier Hard said:
The majority view of Arsenal fans perhaps, there were a significant amount of raised eyebrows from elsewhere at the amount you’d given Aubameyang considering his age. There’s no denying he’s been a very good striker and would’ve been worthy of a new deal but you basically gave him a lovely retirement package and he’s taken that quite literally.
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DH, I’m sorry but I can’t agree with you on this. I’m more than happy to dig out comments/articles/videos at the time, but there were plenty of rival fans and fans of other clubs, in addition to journalists and pundits that had no affinity to Arsenal, who were saying we had to do everything we could to keep him. It wasn’t just Arsenal fans who thought this.

At the time, I still maintain it seemed like a reasonable enough investment. Hindsight has shown that wasn’t the case. Like I said, he did not display any indication whatsoever that his displays were going to drop so hard after signing that new deal. There was absolutely nothing to suggest this was going to happen.
 
Two fantastic goals for Frederiksen for Vitesse in a 2-1 win:
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Brilliant finish on the 2nd.
 
BrunelGunner said:
I’m going to take issue with a lot of people (and I don’t necessarily mean people on this board) doing what I like to call “hindsight analysis”. I’m seeing a lot of it on other forums, social media and news stations.

Aubameyang had given us 3 excellent years of service and single-handedly won us the FA Cup. No-one at the time was bemoaning the decision to give him that contract. In fact, quite the contrary. The narrative was that he’s invaluable to us so give him what he wants. Barcelona were highly interested in him.

There was also no indication his performances were going to fall of a cliff.

Last year, he had malaria, Covid and family issues which disrupted his season (which were exacerbated with Arteta not playing him properly). One below-par season like this can be justified.

Obviously, the behaviour this season and breach of protocols wasn’t expected. So we’ve done the right thing by punishing him. But this is a separate point.

The point I’m making is that it’s easy to say in retrospect we shouldn’t have given him that contract when not many people at the time were arguing that case.
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This is a rare occasion I'm going to have to disagree with you BG.

I no way do I mean to discredit Arsenal's FA Cup win but that period of sport behind closed doors was very much an anomaly (Liverpool were racking up home losses left, right and centre for instance).

Aubameyang has done okay at Arsenal but even at his best he's underwhelmed when it mattered most, his stats look impressive at face value but they are mostly goals vs lesser sides - he had no impact whatsoever in away games vs big 6.

From the outside looking in, the Aubameyang contract seemed like a PR move to appease a fanbase that would have erupted following the controversial departures of Ozil and Sanchez - I don't think there was any footballing reason behind it because there was no way anybody could believe a striker who relies solely on pace and playing off the shoulder of the last man wouldn't decline at 30.
 
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