The thing for me is his head has dropped, last season even in poor all round games, he was upbeat, full of energy and always looked up for it, today he looked miserable and everything he did was half hearted. .
9
Season Average Rating
- Appearances
- 45
- Goals
- 15
- Assists
- 3
- Yellow cards
- 5
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik @Rood and Imran @Annihilate Now! start with the good news by celebrating Manchester United Women's emphatic FA Cup win over Spurs at Wembley and the future of manager Marc Skinner.
Then it's the bad news and the ever worsening form of our Men with losses to Arsenal and Palace.
Finally the main debate - ETH Out now or keep him until the end of the season - if not longer. Are you Team Nik or Team Imran?
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I remember him saying that quality players will join in the summer before end of last season... well, he was lied to, just like supporters.
http://www.espn.com/soccer/manchest...a-lot-of-good-players-in-summer-romelu-lukaku
http://www.espn.com/soccer/manchest...a-lot-of-good-players-in-summer-romelu-lukaku
Umm, I mean he's starting for Juve, who are miles ahead of us. Option on bench ?
Think it was the general consensus when we were linked with him and most were saying no.
Man every time he stops the ball in the channels to face his marker in an attempt to dribble the ball past them, he looks like a complete amateur at football. No natural ball control talent. The sad thing is he’s always just provided an insane work rate and physicality to compensate but that also seems to have faded away this season.
Most here say no to any non flashy names.
Honestly I would have taken Mandzukic as a starter over Lukaku any time. He offers the same as Lukaku and even more.
I'd probably take Arnautovic at this point.
I just have this image of him attempting to hit the ball and subsequently falling on his ass.
Your house mate included of course. Do you know how many strikers that have scored 25 goals in a single league season in the Premier League era?
Think he's tired. He's a twenty-something goal-a-season striker. Nothing more, nothing less. Would have liked to see him bring the leadership qualities he displayed at the World Cup into this season but they look like two different players.
Dunno. 25 is an arbitrary number. Kevin Phillips did. Bent scored 24 at Sunderland in 2010
No he wasn't. After he broke his two and a half month goal drought in the Premier League his next few celebrations were notably sulky and muted. From what I remember it was noticeable enough for threads on here to be made and articles to be written.
Arbitrary number? He scored exactly 25 goals. Phillips - and perhap Salah for now - is the only one that you wouldn't considered a top-top striker that reached that total. You named Phillips and ignored the others. He's comfortably Belgium's all time topscorer and has 105 premier league goals, something only 25 strikers can boast in the Premier League era. He scores(d) at the seventh fastest rate and has the second lowest appearance among every player with 100 premier league goals - he is still 25 years.
There's some out of touch with reality stuff posted on here. More to the point is that no Juventus-like elite European set up would start with Lukaku. Watching yesterday, I would have straight-swapped for Arnautovic.Can't really blame Lukaku too much for letting his head drop. Not only is he playing poorly, but the team is losing games left and right, and the players are split into pro- and anti-Jose factions if rumours are to be believed. Players used as pawns in the manager's PR and power games. Sanchez publicly reprimanded(?) and dropped from the squad entirely, replaced by Martial who was promptly scapegoated by the manager after the match. Bailly dropped for a young midfielder in McTominay who's made to play CB and predictably doesn't do well - said youngster bears the brunt of fans' displeasure while the manager goes on to proclaim that he was the best CB. Manager goes from criticising his players' attitudes in 1 match to criticising their quality in the next.
The dressing room must be a terrible place to be right now.
The dressing room must be a terrible place to be right now.
He has also broken the 20 goal Mark once, so he isn't very prolific. His goals to games in the EPL is similar to Yakubu.
I never believed he was of the standard of a club challenging for honours, yet he's improved my opinion of him with his sheer work rate and effort. The main issue is he misses far too many chances and has such a limited skill set.
Arnautovic might be a unpopular choice but he's a great player and is probably better than Lukaku now. He's poor man's Ibra basically. Shame about Lukaku, it's hard to play in this team under Mourinho but everything he does is off, he should start from workrate again, he looks like the laziest striker around.
He's good enough to be a squad player at a world class club but that is about it unfortunately.
Lukaku was simply atrocious yesterday, didn't look in the slightest bit interested. His hold up play is awful and for a big man he losses possession very easily, has no guile and doesn't seem to read the game well.
He will score a few goals but his lack of fluidity really damages our attacks, personally I don't think he can play up front alone and isn't good enough to be a target man, compared to Arnautovic he was useless.
He will score a few goals but his lack of fluidity really damages our attacks, personally I don't think he can play up front alone and isn't good enough to be a target man, compared to Arnautovic he was useless.
I don't rate him, however our poor style of play is not helping him.
If he was called Anthony or Marcus he would have been dropped by now
If he was called Anthony or Marcus he would have been dropped by now
No it's not. Yakubu has 96 goals in 250 games. Lukaku has 105 goals in just over 210 games.
In anything, those stats show that Yakubu was, in fact, a very decent goal scorer.
Does it not really show that goal stats alone are a shallow way of judging a strikers worth?
Give me a forward scoring 18-20 goals a season but is also adaptable, technically sound and brings the best out of the attackers around him every time over the 35 goal man who makes the team predictable.
Give me a forward scoring 18-20 goals a season but is also adaptable, technically sound and brings the best out of the attackers around him every time over the 35 goal man who makes the team predictable.
People keep repeating his goal scoring record when we all know already he's a flat track bully who will score loads against relegation fodders and in 3-0 or 4-0. He hasn't proved anything else either with us or Belgium.
I thought he was out of order saying that. He's not the bloody assistant manager. Also a bit rich of him to say when he's not a 'quality' player.
I love Rom, but we really should have put more focus on bringing in a new striker in the summer. Not necessarily a big-name signing, but a rotation option for Lukaku - coz right now, he needs dropping and we dont have an alternative. Rashford cannot lead the line, he's proven that in the past.
He really needs a goal to pick up his overall attacking play. He seemed like one of the few players yesterday that was trying to chase the ball a little bit, everyone else was happy to stand off.
He's also not a target man, we're using him as one and we don't create nearly enough for him.
I've criticized him earlier this season but West Ham wasn't on him.
We created two chances all game.
Lukaku is an average player. He has no hold up play, cannot beat defenders, has an average finish or a terrible finish. His overall play is terrible for a club with ambitions to win the league let alone for a top-4 team.
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Why is he so bad at judging the bounce of the ball?
Input lag
Rom is not a United striker, but more importantly he is not a Jose striker. Jose attacking style of play is to have a striker who can hold the play and bring others in. He did it with Drogba, reason why Lampard scored so many, again with Milito, reason why Sneijder did well, again with Costa, reason why Hazard did so well and had his first decent season.
Lukaku cannot offer that. Can score a goal here and there, but in terms of anything else, he offers very little or is not good at it. Reason why our attacks can be bland at times compared to Jose's previous teams. Lukaku just does not have the ability to keep hold of the ball and is not aggressive enough like Costa, Drogba and Milito to be a Jose type of striker.
Jose should have known this when he went for him.
Lukaku cannot offer that. Can score a goal here and there, but in terms of anything else, he offers very little or is not good at it. Reason why our attacks can be bland at times compared to Jose's previous teams. Lukaku just does not have the ability to keep hold of the ball and is not aggressive enough like Costa, Drogba and Milito to be a Jose type of striker.
Jose should have known this when he went for him.
There's some truth in this. I said previously in Mourinho first season here with Zlatan up front we were creating loads of chances per game and our problem was to convert them. Enter Lukaku, and suddenly our chance creation dropped massively. Even in Mourinho first season we always looked poor when the big man wasn't playing.
Now Zlatan wasn't very clinical and missed many chances I know, but he was the reason we were creating chances to start with. Best football under Mourinho here, result aside, was with Zlatan leading the line.
I would say it's more the pattern of movement. Lukaku is a big guy but he's more of a Hernandez than a Drogba.
Don't get me wrong, he hasn't been great this season but the way we play doesn't help him IMO.
Still a fan but I’ll admit he hasn’t improved anywhere close to what I thought he would. I ignored his shortcomings because of how good he is in front of goal. But even that’s not happening for him right now and his confidence looks shot.
There's a lot of truth in that, I think. We launch the ball long to him at least 5-10 times a game, but he's terrible at heading the ball as he doesn't get much lift into his jumps, so usually that tactic is wasted. Not sure why we keep doing it, surely someone must see that it's pointless. Might as well just give the ball to one of our midfielders and instruct them to keep trying to dribble the whole of the opposition.
It's a shame Zlatan got injured, as did Rojo in that one match in the EL. Both I think were key members of our first season and improve us.
With regards to Lukaku, I think he should play RW for us for a while. He's good dribbling off of that side and has a good shot or cross. Maybe try playing Rashford in the striker role again for now. Won't happen though.
Agree. In Jose's first season we pummeled teams, but either the players did not have the goalscoring boots on or the opposition keepers had the game of their lives.
Zlatan was a fantastic player. Such a shame he got injured when he did.
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