Well if he has a bad knee problem, which everybody knows about, why are there teams still coming in for him? Burnley played him in their pre season games, Forest and QPR are both after him, so is it a case of his knee being not up to PL standards, even though we play less games? I think the knee problem story was bollocks. It'll have been something else, probably money related, that caused it to fall through.
I would of said that city wasn't prepared to gamble 4.5 million on a player when his knee could be potentially shot and surgery would mean a long lay off , that's not to say that some other club won't gamble on him but I bet his value has dropped .
If it was bollocks, then Burnley would have said so, as we gave them a copy of our findings, they have not criticised us at all, so it was obviously genuine. Not only do I know it was genuine, but I know that our whole management team were absolutely gutted, as they thought we'd finally got out striker situation sorted. I also know we've drawn up contracts for other strikers who's deals fell through, I don't know the players involved, but I know one if them was someone nobody ever linked us to.
Get the feeling we might still take the plunge with one more forward? I could see us leaving Proschwitz in Germany if we can get away with it and get cover.
It's getting a little harder to predict now. I'd say a defensive midfielder was the only dead cert, but if the right deal came up, I wouldn't be surprised to see an additional striker, or an attacking midfielder. If the right deals came up, we might get a little more active with moving players out too, if anyone in Germany wanted Proschwitz, I'm sure we'd be more than happy to let him go.
D I'd say there has to be a problem with the knee. I'd have been convinced the problems were elsewhere until the club publicly identified the issue. If they have just 'made it up' without concrete evidence, then there could be liability issues over the resale value of Austin, should we be found to have damaged his transfer value by claiming non existent knee issues.
It's amazing that clubs just above us in the possible final positions are paying £12m for strikers. I'm happy to get Sagbo for the likely transfer fee and wages but I would have thought that if we rated Hooper to do a good job and he wasn't asking silly wages then £5m would have been worth paying.
Even if we'd matched Norwich in every aspect of the deal, he'd have gone to them. We'd have had to pay over the odds to bring him here over them, and it is alleged that his wage demands were already a bit fruity. We did the right thing to pull out when we did and move on to other options.
We've had a goal scoring problem for too long now. If we don't address it we will get relegated. We can scour the world to get a bargain or pay over the odds in the major leagues. Either way it has to be addressed. We should be able to tell if a player will be a good goalscorer given our style of play.
I'm honestly starting to think that the problem isn't our strikers but the formation/team play. Having 7 strikers isn't the solution. I think we're relying too much on crosses (which in most cases are very poorly delivered). We never seem to cut in the box and pull it back or play one two's in the middle of the pitch. It seems to be an automatic thing to get brady and elmo involved in the play. Too predictable.
Actually, until Aluko got injured, we played it down the middle quite a lot. It was when he got injured we relied on the wings. Now, we will have options to go either way. Personally, I also think we are too light going forward and it may well cost us. Graham is the only real proven PL striker and he comes with an element of doubt. Fryatt, Prossy and Sagbo are most likely to not be up to it, but time.wilI.tell. I also think that 3-5-2 is more likely to prove to be a mistake than not, especially given how much better we looked playing 4-4-2 against Cardiff with Rosie at right back. Having said that, our best 3-5-2 matches were before Aluko got injured. Let's hope we don't rely too much on Aluko.
I think 4-4-2 with a holding midfield is more solid than 3-5-2. I am happy for Bruce to make things flexible and work on the players understanding of the different formations. One of the "2" has to be a goalscorer though!
People keep mentioning this "proven premiership goalscorer". Was Van Persie a proven goal scorer before his prolific Arsenal season? Was Danny Graham before his move to Swansea? Was Benteke before he went to Villa? My point is, every single striker requires somebody to take a "punt" on them before they become proven. Considering we have just been promoted, we have to find the next goalscorer.
Van Persie. Yes, he was bloody brilliant, but he was always injured. Benteke. Yes, or at least 1 goal every 2 games is not to be sniffed at. Graham. Sort of, but for Watford, so probably doesn't count. He certainly isn't in the same league as the two above guys though. Hopefully, both he and Sagbo will seize their chances though because we are shagged if they don't.
Benteke scored 8 the season before he moved, the same as Sagbo. Van Persie hardly scored any in the Prem, he got a few. But he was never a goalscorer. Danny Graham hadn't played in the prem before Swansea?
Agreed. Other teams can have a proven goalscorer and a few unproven which may come good. We seems to prefer to risk all unproven.
