Strength up front

[Topper 123]

36 minutes ago, SecretSam said:

I hear that Haaland lad's pretty handy

Too big 

[TheReds]

7 minutes ago, Top Robin said:

he has been met with a tirade of criticism and abuse from some

Seriously? 

The bar must have seriously been moved down if this thread is classed as a "tirade of criticism and abuse". Abuse ffs.

[Topper 123]

21 minutes ago, TheReds said:

Ah resort to the old insults. You haven't made a good point yet, and have even been disingenuous with the stats of one shot against Millwall, I'm sure it was an honest mistake.

You are the one asking Lansdown to loosen the purse strings not me. I am sure you have some sort idea who you want and at what cost, and what they would bring to the team, or you are just asking a stupid question in the first place. You don't need to be privy to any information.

I guess you'd be happy with a 50k purchase from non league as long as it's a big man? If not, then who would you go after? It really is just a straightforward question.
 

Joao Lucas would have been my choice and stated this last season before he came off the bench for reading to score against us . Was a free agent at start of season but recently joined Shanghai port abroad ,sort of strong player who has troubled us for years 

12 minutes ago, Top Robin said:

Blimey....Magger1 just came up with a perfectly reasonable suggestion, albeit not worded particularly well, and he has been met with a tirade of criticism and abuse from some who have clearly woken up this morning spoiling for an argument.

Like us, he's a City fan who wants them to do well and felt that a big striker may be the option.

To be honest, if it were a big target man but with good feet skills, it may be worth a punt.

And it's up to personnel at the club to decide if they want to take this route and who to target and how much to spend...that's what they are paid to do.

Sort of abuse I laugh at mate

[Topper 123]

12 minutes ago, TheReds said:

Seriously? 

The bar must have seriously been moved down if this thread is classed as a "tirade of criticism and abuse". Abuse ffs.

Hahahaha ffs 

[Top Robin]

15 minutes ago, TheReds said:

Seriously? 

The bar must have seriously been moved down if this thread is classed as a "tirade of criticism and abuse". Abuse ffs.

Yeh maybe not abuse...more condescending and taking the p*ss

[Colemanballs]

1 hour ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Came off the bench Saturday and helped set up their equaliser..

Friend who supports Bournekurh told me a little while ago he's settling in quite nicely and a full pre-season would help him. That said football moves fast and they have varied options up front and out wide.

The assist for the equaliser was fortuitous to say the least - a horribly miscued shot that took a deflection to Solanke. However, the Bournemouth fans were very impressed with his performance. Some random quotes from their forum:

Quote

 

"Semenyo- what an incredible cameo. It’s hard to emphasise just how important his physicality was today. He allowed us to consistently force West Ham back and to gain territory high up the pitch, this enabled us to apply sustained periods of pressure which eventually forced the equaliser. His pace and power really is something else. Will be an asset for sure."

"Rothwell and semenyo were the key highlights for me."

"Semenyo, what a cameo, he belongs at this level on that showing and we do have another striker option on the books."

 

 

[stephenkibby.]

16 hours ago, slartibartfast said:

I'm old enough to remember in the 60's /early 70's the fad for the "Twin Spearhead".......two big powerful guys, great in the air, no slouches on the ground, players like Ron and Wyn Davies (Wales) ,Ron Davies/ Martin Chivers (Soton), John O'hare/Kevin Hector (Derby) and even (to a lesser extent) our own John Atyeo/Brian Clark, oh ,and Hull's Ken Wagstaff and Chris Chilton.I'm sure many olduns  could rattle off a few more, and I won't even mention Geoff Bradford and Alfie Biggs !

Billy Rafferty & Paul Mariner.

[Rob k]

1 hour ago, Magger1 said:

Brilliant I know , if your happy with what we create then great I personally don’t think we create a lot and would like a mobile bigger forward so we are not bullied as was bell Saturday 

Bell should be burried his chance though to be fair 

[sunningdalered]

I find it a bit disappointing that whenever anyone on here suggests that we are a bit lightweight up front they get met with such overwhelming criticism (although not really amounting to abuse IMO) . Yes, we do have a number of attacking options, and anyone coming in would have to fit with the way that NP wants the team to play, but I don't see why the recruitment philosophy that we are deploying in other areas of the pitch can't equally apply to the forward line. I don't think it's outrageous to suggest that a young player with pace and more of a physical presence would improve our attacking threat. I admire the academy pathway model, but would also hope that Tins has on his radar a few strikers of this ilk who are a little further along the development path. 

[Robbored]

1 hour ago, Top Robin said:

City fan who wants them to do well and felt that a big striker may be the option.

To be honest, if it were a big target man but with good feet skills, it may be worth a punt.

Been there, done. Djuric and Martin the most recent.

Having a target man these days is old school. Its weakness outweigh its effectiveness. 

There’s a tendency with a target man up top to lump ball upto him looking for a knock on that rarely pays off and 75% of the time City are on the back foot once possession is lost. 

Proper managers adopt more sophisticated approaches to creating chances these days.

 

[cityal]

36 minutes ago, sunningdalered said:

I find it a bit disappointing that whenever anyone on here suggests that we are a bit lightweight up front they get met with such overwhelming criticism (although not really amounting to abuse IMO) . Yes, we do have a number of attacking options, and anyone coming in would have to fit with the way that NP wants the team to play, but I don't see why the recruitment philosophy that we are deploying in other areas of the pitch can't equally apply to the forward line. I don't think it's outrageous to suggest that a young player with pace and more of a physical presence would improve our attacking threat. I admire the academy pathway model, but would also hope that Tins has on his radar a few strikers of this ilk who are a little further along the development path. 

It is hard to argue that up front we are lacking physicality in our front line. But in fairness to others posting (/critiquing) on this thread I think it is also hard to read the first post as anything other than a call to spend significant sums of money in that "specialist" role.  - "Mr lansdown it’s time you loosened the purse strings and allowed for a major signing up front,a forward who can hold the ball up and bring players in"

Given our play style up front, spending significantly on such a player (and potentially destroying our hard won lower wage structure in process) seems at best risky and at worst Ashton-esque.

Maybe the club see Seb Palmer Holden as this option in future? - in the meantime they are perhaps ok with what we have options wise?

The rest of the window could be interesting, but I won't be too upset if we arrive on Sep 1st with the same players we now have in the squad. Arguably the money we have could be better spent on rewarding and tying down, Zak, Pring, Bell & Conway for a few more years.

[Topper 123]

28 minutes ago, Robbored said:

Been there, done. Djuric and Martin the most recent.

Having a target man these days is old school. Its weakness outweigh its effectiveness. 

There’s a tendency with a target man up top to lump ball upto him looking for a knock on that rarely pays off and 75% of the time City are on the back foot once possession is lost. 

Proper managers adopt more sophisticated approaches to creating chances these days.

 

Like the big bloke for Man City :laugh:

[Davefevs]

3 hours ago, Magger1 said:

Brilliant I know , if your happy with what we create then great I personally don’t think we create a lot and would like a mobile bigger forward so we are not bullied as was bell Saturday 

The thing is that you’ve just picked one stat to base your argument on, in a small sample of two games.  It’s got little context.

Shots on Target obviously doesn’t include shots that:

• hit the woodwork
• go a cm wide
• are blocked by a defender

Even if you hate xG, it’s a better guideline to chances created than shots on target.  We could’ve had 5 twenty-yard dribblers out if desperation, but on target.

Heres a summary of our shots:

Some desperate defending by Millwall for a couple of chances that don’t get classed as “on target”

Where did I say I’m happy with what we create?  I was very happy with our performance, pretty happy with the situations we created from our attacking play, albeit a tad disappointed with the ultimate outcomes.  It’s the hardest part of the game, putting it in the net.  Wells flashed a couple of crosses across the box, Bell got fouled as he was about to go one on one.  Penalty or free-kick / red card.

But on the balance of the game, our opponent, I’d say it’s typical of what most would call a “good, solid away performance and deserved result”.

Out of interest, who was Bell bullied by on Saturday?  For much of the game he was up against McNamara, and I don’t really recall seeing him get bullied.

 

Sorry, one last point, who are the examples of the big, mobile striker you’re after that are realistic for us?  

Do we change our style / tactics to match the opposition, e.g. big v big for Millwall, or try to take advantage of the differences.  “Little” Nahki Wells ran “Big” Jake Cooper all over the pitch.  Lumping it up to “big x”, does that help or hinder the tactical objective?

Would “Big x” (even if mobile as you say) have pressed as hard as Wells, or Bell, or Sykes, or Yeboah?

Assuming not, then Billy Mitchell gets time in the centre of the pitch to influence.

Whatever team / players / system Nige chooses there are trade-offs, pros and cons….those trade-offs, pros and cons might be different for different opponents.

There are two sides to the game, we set up to make it hard for Millwall to get their WBs forward.  That probably stifled some attacking intent.

Tell you what, if we play “functionally” all season, limited good chances, but equally, we give even less away at the back, like we did on Saturday, I’ll be more than happy.

Edited August 14, 2023 by Davefevs

[sunningdalered]

17 minutes ago, Robbored said:

Been there, done. Djuric and Martin the most recent.

Having a target man these days is old school. Its weakness outweigh its effectiveness. 

There’s a tendency with a target man up top to lump ball upto him looking for a knock on that rarely pays off and 75% of the time City are on the back foot once possession is lost. 

Proper managers adopt more sophisticated approaches to creating chances these days.

 

And, with respect, I think therein lies the problem. You're right, that is the old school model. Why immediately assume that physicality has to come from a Bob Latchford type? And why does it automatically lead to us punting it forward at every opportunity? I don't see Brentford constantly hoofing it towards Mbeumo and hoping he'll get a knock on. 

Not sure what your definition of a proper manager or more sophisticated approaches is, but I think you'd struggle to identify many of the better teams in the EPL who don't have a physical element to their forward line.

Nige might not fancy it, that's his perogative, but for some, me included, it might be the thing that adds the extra 10-15% that we need to get closer to a top 10 finish. 

[Robbored]

9 minutes ago, Magger1 said:

Like the big bloke for Man City

Haaland is just a bit special and Man City create for him without lumping it.

[Davefevs]

5 minutes ago, sunningdalered said:

And, with respect, I think therein lies the problem. You're right, that is the old school model. Why immediately assume that physicality has to come from a Bob Latchford type? And why does it automatically lead to us punting it forward at every opportunity? I don't see Brentford constantly hoofing it towards Mbeumo and hoping he'll get a knock on. 

Not sure what your definition of a proper manager or more sophisticated approaches is, but I think you'd struggle to identify many of the better teams in the EPL who don't have a physical element to their forward line.

Nige might not fancy it, that's his perogative, but for some, me included, it might be the thing that adds the extra 10-15% that we need to get closer to a top 10 finish. 

And to @Magger1 - don’t get me wrong if there was an Ellis Simms type available in our budget then I could see the clamour…but I’d still be thinking, who are we gonna sell / move-on out of the 7 forwards (the current 6 plus Weimann).

[cityal]

To also come back on what was said about so few chances/shots created against Millwall last weekend

This is last seasons defensive stats sorted by xGA  (a larger sample size ) - Millwall were the best non-promoted side defensively last season. 

[Rob k]

3 minutes ago, Robbored said:

Haaland is just a bit special and Man City create for him without lumping it.

He also does very little but score!! Also a bit different when you have De Bryne, Grealish, Foden etc behind you setting up chances 

[Rob k]

4 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

And to @Magger1 - don’t get me wrong if there was an Ellis Simms type available in our budget then I could see the clamour…but I’d still be thinking, who are we gonna sell / move-on out of the 7 forwards (the current 6 plus Weimann).

Am i right in thinking that we don’t actually have much room wages wise to bring in more players now?

[Mr Popodopolous]

Haaland is a bit of a phenomenon but thete are others who also had variable all-round contributions.

Gomez, Ibrahimovic and Mandzukic.

I'm not necessarily saying oh we need a big striker, must get a big striker but these all flourished to varying degrees in footballing sides or sides with a style that maybe countered vs bigger sides, played football v similar and lower.

[chinapig]

22 minutes ago, sunningdalered said:

I don't see Brentford constantly hoofing it towards Mbeumo and hoping he'll get a knock on. 

They do often hit it long to Toney though he tends to move to the left when they do rather than them just launching it down the middle.

[sunningdalered]

We don't have to look too far from home for a decent example of what we might be missing. It's Semenyo's combination of strength and pace that continues to be regarded as his main asset, not strength or pace alone. He wasn't always a 10M striker, so maybe Tins can unearth the next Semenyo-type forward who can play more effectively through the middle. Might be a tall order, but a total reliance upon the academy to produce these players is, equally, asking a lot IMO. 

[Davefevs]

18 minutes ago, sunningdalered said:

We don't have to look too far from home for a decent example of what we might be missing. It's Semenyo's combination of strength and pace that continues to be regarded as his main asset, not strength or pace alone. He wasn't always a 10M striker, so maybe Tins can unearth the next Semenyo-type forward who can play more effectively through the middle. Might be a tall order, but a total reliance upon the academy to produce these players is, equally, asking a lot IMO. 

It’s why in January, Chiedozie Ogbene was top of my list…a cheaper option (relative to the money we’d get for Semenyo), but stylistically similar.

Rotherham wouldn’t sell though…to anyone (we weren’t the only ones interested), and now Luton are PL, they got him this summer.

I previously liked Daniel Udoh (Shrewsbury) but he did his ACL last August…and was probably erring towards the wrong age to have real confidence that he could be a top Champ player.

I do think Conway has a pretty good all-round game (not totally rounded) to mean the priority dropped.  Lots of different priorities, and when you’re under financial constraints that matters.

[Monkeh]

I think we all would love a new striker, but there are other parts if the team that need much more attention, up front, even with injuries isn't a place we urgently need to strengthen,

[ExiledAjax]

2 hours ago, Davefevs said:

Even if you hate xG, it’s a better guideline to chances created than shots on target.

And so far, over a tiny sample size, our xG is pretty poor. Just below 1 per game, and with an average xG per shot of 0.1. That's worse than our average over last season by some stretch (1.25 and 0.12 respectively).

The saving grace is that xG against is likewise lower, again hovering just below 1 overall, and average xG per shot against is just 0.9. Last season those were 1.3 and 0.11 respectively.

So very early signs that in the League we're a bit less dangerous up top, but equally quite a bit tighter at the back.

There is some argument that these numbers mean we should sign a striker, however I personally think they don't give enough detail to conclude that. 

As always, all that really matters is that we score 15 or so more than we concede over the season.

[REDOXO]

I don’t see anything as being ‘urgent’ 

We have a team that is bedding in, that have defended well and only conceded a league goal to a blatant handball. 
 

We have a few to come back in, which has started and we created quite a few opportunities against a side tipped to challenge the top six scoring a winner from midfield in injury time

Can we bring in players at the right price that improves the squad? Yes probably! Will we have an urgent need if we have to sell Vyner or if a very good offer comes in for Pring? Yes definitely. 
 

However what we are doing is looking at players we can develop to the level they can compete with what’s here as they complete their contracts. 
 

I don’t see the need for a target man striker, bringing one in can make things worse not better. As much as I liked Adebola it changed the way we played and we became more obvious and less effective. For example. 
 

The manager has a style and is mirroring what he has done before and at the moment we are competitive because of it. 

[Superjack]

9 hours ago, Robbored said:

Been there, done. Djuric and Martin the most recent.

Having a target man these days is old school. Its weakness outweigh its effectiveness. 

There’s a tendency with a target man up top to lump ball upto him looking for a knock on that rarely pays off and 75% of the time City are on the back foot once possession is lost. 

Proper managers adopt more sophisticated approaches to creating chances these days.

 

Agreed. 

 

I did like Duric though.

[ChrisBW]

We need a forward. Someone with a bit more physicality, like a Michael Smith.