Roberto Soldado. You could be forgiven for looking at Llorente these past few weeks and thinking "wow", I did myself and he's a top drawer striker but there are two reasons to look elsewhere. 1) Bilbao won't sell him regardless of price. They have an up and coming team with a great mix of youth and experience and they will at least want one more season to see where it goes. 2) As great as Llorente is, I believe Soldado is better suited to what we lack up front. Hear me out. At our brilliant best footballing wise (regardless of result) we've completely played teams off the park with fluent movement, intelligent passing and work rate. We've obviously lacked one thing though, a goal scorer. When we've been good though it has all been about players interchanging their positions and not having a fixed focus up front to aim at. Torres was never that, he moved around, he came wide for the ball, he had a little bit of everything and I believe Soldado is very similar. Soldado is a more natural finisher than Llorente I believe despite the Bilbao front man having 2 more goals this season. Soldado is able to score a wider variety of goals and is more skillful, though powerful I would take Soldado's skill over Llorente's power. Soldado's instinct inside the box is fantastic. He will find space where most players won't, he will constantly run across his man to create space or to take advantage of a defender who isn't alert to the situation. He'll score you those tap ins that we've been missing so badly. Valencia are a selling club and while Soldado could be great, he isn't yet. We need a player that Suarez will work well off if he is to stay and again I just think Soldado fits the bill. So in conclusion we need Soldado's natural instinct more than Llorente's power.
Nice 2:58am thread. I have never seen this guy play, and dont even know what he looks like. Is he similar to any current Premier League strikers? Who would you play him with in a line up?
He would transform us, although I actually prefer Lavezzi as an all round footballer ------Lavezzi----------------Suarez---- ---------------Cavani--------------- A man can dream
Amazing! And yes a dream. We'll struggle to get the rest until we start climing the League. FA Cup would raise our stocks.
We have strikers, they can score, they've all had blips or and been unfortunate at the ame time it seems, they've all had a shot at hitting the bar and post near misses and shots right at the keeper aswell as plenty of brilliant saves against us. All in al this team will score plenty more next season without additions, it has literally been one of those seasons, 33 goals FFS, thats not poor finishing alone, terribly luck too to have a tally that low. To think the players we bought cannot score and need new players, Suarez just plain unlucky to not have 15 16 goals and his confidence is suffering currently. Carroll should have more, 10 11 maybe, bar post and missed pens. Adam should have 6 or 7, downing 4 or 5 Kuyt about 10. Its not that we dont have the players, the players just didnt do it in front of goal. I can only imagine in training they get smacked into the onion sack then it doesn't go right on match day. Training tactics and technique all need work by the look of how it went in front of goal this season. Not bags of cash thrown at teh problem, I will only be happy to see a big forward name arriving if we move one out. With even a sliver of luck we'd be fighting for 4th, everything considered over the last 12 months, with it all the way it has gone, we could be 11th 12th and no cups. Under the circumstanmces Kenny has actually done a fantastic job with this misfiring bunch It will change trust me
Our supporters have repeatedly lacked support from midfield to, and the whole team should chip in goals. Gerrard, Suarez and Carroll have linked up nicely when they have played together, they just havnt played together enough. I think adding another creative player to that trio, creating a quad, could work wonders. I'v often though we'd be better with two players running of Suarez, one either side. Thomas Muller, Lavezzi or even Arjen Robben are worth taking a look at. ---------------Gerrard-------------- ----Muller-----------------Suarez--- ---------------Carroll--------------- But a quick, pacey alternative to Carroll should be sign to. Variety is good.
How much you reckon we have to spend? We've spent a lot on not a lot, so i'm not sure how much will be available.
We only spent about 30mill. Most of the owners investment went towards ending contracts or still paying the wages of players out on loan (we pay part of Cole and Poulsen's wages still). I wouldn't expect them to give us more than another 30mill this summer - they're not oil rich mafia members and nor would I want them to be - plus whatever we recoup from sales. Maybe more if we get CL football though, but that's another story.
Well he knows how to score, but I would like to think we would look for someone younger and, how would you describe it erm.. oh yes I know, Better!
Huntelar is likely to be on the move in the summer, he is a goal scorer and would not be that expensive.
Never really seen him play but I have heard that he's got great potential. At 25 he may hit his peak in a year or two so could be a very good buy.
I would guess at something around the £50m mark, plus the eventual sales of Cole and Aquilani, so maybe a little bit more. Might be a couple surprise sales like Kuyt or something, just speculating there. I think Hazard is being targetted by a lot of big clubs at the moment and will end up at like City or in Madrid or somewhere, I think we could get Muniain from Bilbao, plus I agree with who mentioned Muller from Bayern, infact I wouldn't mind any German front man at the moment..... Gomez, Muller, Gotze or Schweinsteiger in midfield.
Sorry, had a quick job come in. Dont know too much on him as only really seen highlights but certainly seen him score a few good ones. How old though as he does seem to have been around a while?
He's 30 according to Wiki. I'm not too sure on Lambert... Done very well for the past couple of seasons but there would be question marks about his ability to step up to the Premier League and score on a regular basis. It's a no for me.
