Graham and Sagbo haven't been missing loads of chances so it's not as simple as us needing a finisher. We need someone up there to cause the opposition more of a problem more of the time, like Fletcher did to us yesterday.
I'd sign a couple - Carlton Cole (He's only on short term contracts at WHU) then someone like Long. No signing from the lower leagues - they're all a risk. A bit of experience mixed in with Gedo, Sagbo and Prossy - sack off the rest. I look at Graham and whilst he works incredibly hard, he hasn't even come close to scoring. He needs to drop back down to the Championship and find his scoring boots and confidence.
Lower league players are risks but Carlton Cole isn't? I hate the excuse of "oh, he's from the Championship, it would be a risk". Look back over the last few seasons - those players who had a fantastic season previous, such as Lambert, Holt, Le Fondre, even Graham, and then going back further to Kevin Phillips - all of those had fantastic seasons in the Prem. Rhodes is arguably the most talented of all those that have been recently. He'd be worth it.
I do think Cairney, Fryatt + £3-4m would be a good deal for everyone concerned. We get the prolific striker we need, they keep Cairney and get an adequate replacement for Rhodes + the money.
Carlton Cole has played at this level. The gulf between a decent Championship striker and a PL striker is massive, and a gap that for us wouldn't be bridged by Rhodes. I asked a former City player what his thoughts on a few players we'd been linked with where, One of those was Cole, who he said was , exceptional and a huge threat.
I really don't think he's had many chances. One at Tottenham when he was offside anyway isn't enough to decide he can't finish. Especially when he's done it for other teams and scored a **** load. It's alright talking about signing Rhodes but Graham has done exactly what Rhodes has done in the lower leagues and also scored at this level too. If Rhodes went a few games without scoring like Graham has, our KC experts would write him off in the exact same way they've written Graham off already. He's already got the 'new McLean' reputation of being a hard-working but scruffy player. It's a myth. If you look at the game yesterday we lacked an Aluko type player, not a finisher. The striker got one chance and scored, just as he did at Everton. For three years we've had strikers missing chances but this year it's not the same at all. It's all longshots and crosses. Clear chances for the strikers have been extremely sparse. Sagbo has probably had two real chances and scored both. Graham has hardly had any either. Huddlestone, Livermore etc have probably had more shots than the CFs have. What we need is more players who can break a defence down, ideally offering some width and if we sign a striker it needs to be someone who gives us another way of breaking teams down and getting behind them.
Asmir Begovic has scored more goals in 2013 than Danny Graham. Nah, just winding you up, but Graham is becoming frustrating. I wouldn't ever put him in the same category as McLean as that's just insulting but it is worrying when a striker hasn't scored for nearly a whole year. IMO, Sagbo gets into better positions, holds the ball up better and links up with his team-mates better than what Graham does. The positive is, he's free. He's only on loan so it's not like we've gone and thrown a couple of million at another striker who can't score for toffee (which we seem to now be experts in).
I don't know what your love affair with Danny Graham is based on, but he has had a genuine goalscoring opportunity in pretty much every game we've played this season and he hasn't taken it. He isn't a **** footballer, he's just out of form and as I've mentioned before (as have others), he'd probably benefit from dropping to the Championship and finding his shooting boots again. We don't want playes who were good once (like Graham) or are apparently going to be good (like Altidore), we need somebody who's good NOW, and preferrably in form. Rhodes is one of the most in form strikers in the country, he gets my vote. Danny Ings is also good, but I think he'd benefit from staying with Burnley.
I'd love for us to go for Rhodes, but only at the right price. But I agree 100% about what PLT said about Graham.
I would hate to think we spent anywhere near £6m on Rhodes, particularly if Long was available for £5m.
Rhodes - Apps 241 Goals 134 Graham - Apps 247 Goals 86 They're both their career goalscoring records in the Football League, nowhere near comparable.
Slightly O/T, Just been watching some clips from boothferry legend which brought back memories of Chris Chilton & Ken Wagstaff, how i wish we had those two today, I believe we would be top eight easily, oh for the days we could score for fun. I also believe strikers do come in pairs and work off each other. Does anyone else remember those days.
I think that deal would be great but unfortunately I'd suppose it's just wishful thinking. Naturally, I’ve no idea on what would secure Rhodes, but to say that deal ‘should’ cover it, is presuming a lot to say the least. Despite and with their problems, they’ll want a fair whack of what they paid for him. It’d be fantastic if we could get Rhodes and Long (or Rhodes and Cole (as GLP suggested)) but as cash is naturally in short supply and that probably after securing Livermore, I really can’t see much more purse being widened.
We could sneak a sly little, "we were hoping that Evans was an exchange player too" sort of gesture in... Evans, Cairney and Fryatt + £2M for Rhodes. That's probably, IMO, around £2.5M for them three altogether (Fryatt £1M and Evans and Cairney just under, can't remember Evans' fee but I think it was around £800,000, could be wrong).
