Matheus Cunha | Release clause met, transfer being finalised

I like him as a player and I like that we know he can handle the league. He's also got an edge to him that we're definitely missing in terms of attitude/ego

The price is definitely high though, if we're serious about reversing this reputation of selling clubs bending us over all the time I'm not sure this will help (I know it's a clause but still) If the club are set on him coming in then I hope they get some other deals done first at more reasonable prices - I wouldn't want this fee informing others this summer if our very limited budget is to be believed
 
Dion said:
Understat has him at 14 goals from 7.16 xG, fbref has him at 14 goals from 7.3xG. Can I politely suggest you might be looking at npxG+xAG (which is 14.1 on fbref and 13.57 on understat)? Either that or FootyStats xG model is absolutely nonsense.

Just to make it absolutely clear though, he is over-performing his xG by double this season according to every reasonable model https://www.instagram.com/officialwhoscored/p/DEKF2w5xrOt/
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It's definitely xG on FootyStats, but checking Opta's Analyst he's overperforming his xG by almost double as you say. It's possible that he's become a better than average finisher, or he'll revert closer to to his xG.

Did you have any thoughts on the rest of the post though? He's better than Garnacho at almost every facet of football, by a significant amount in a lot of cases.
 
Dion said:
Understat has him at 14 goals from 7.16 xG, fbref has him at 14 goals from 7.3xG. Can I politely suggest you might be looking at npxG+xAG (which is 14.1 on fbref and 13.57 on understat)? Either that or FootyStats xG model is absolutely nonsense.

Just to make it absolutely clear though, he is over-performing his xG by double this season according to every reasonable model https://www.instagram.com/officialwhoscored/p/DEKF2w5xrOt/
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Probably overperforming, but an expectation of close to 10 goals and 10 assist over a season for an attacking midfielder for a team like Wolves? I would argue that is quite good. For a bit better team, that is surely more than twenty. For really good teams? Probably figures similar to where he is today and a player like Saka.
 
Dion said:
I think that's worth highlighting, for sure. The problem I have with the argument is that he also isn't a prolific creator, which is the other aspect of being a 10. His return for Wolves is kind of what I'm highlighting really, he's scored 26 goals from 17xG and since the start of 2024 he's overperformed his xG by 8.5. He's not an elite finisher, he's just in the form of his life and we need to spend the money knowing that we'll be buying his actual level, which is much lower.

£62m for 10 goals and 5 assists a season if he does well, on a guy who turns 26 in May because his workrate and physicality is good... maybe that's the going rate nowadays and I'm being harsh on him, but it doesn't feel like good business to me.
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I hear you. But there also just has to be an argument for a manager feeling a player is the best fit. Obviously this very often doesn't work but signings like mane, wijnaldum and salah for pool were probably not top priority among Liverpool fans. When gyokeres went to sporting plenty were probably wondering who he is.

Amorim strikes me as a very very particular manager, similar to Klopp. While I felt ten hag was more motivated by signing players he knew and trusted I get a sense amorim wants an exact type of person in each role. I bloody hope so at least
 
Widow said:
With a little coaching, he'll be perfect for the RWB. Our very own Quenda
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The same Quenda that rejected us because he doesn’t want to play as a wingback?

If we are sticking with this coach then we have to buy a proper right wingback. Amad needs to play in his best position, not shoehorned into a role.
 
Imagine watching our games week in week out and trying to be negative about Cunha, bizarre. Hope he is not reading this thread.
 
roseguy64 said:
I have no doubts he's absolutely a talented player. It's blatantly obvious a player with his temperament is gonna have massive issues with a move to a club like Man Utd. He'd be better served going to Chelsea or Arsenal.
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You’re basing this on what, that he has a bit of a temper?
It didn’t harm Cantona, Rooney or Keane at United.
 
The Irish Connection said:
Cunha, Osimhen, Frimpong, Ederson and a keeper. Sorted.
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It seems very unlikely especially with our finances but if we can get rid of Rashford, Sancho, Antony, Casemiro, Lindelof, Eriksen, Onana and Shaw that immediately has a huge positive impact on our wage structure and could make it possible. But in all honesty without CL football it's all fantasy.
 
Garethw said:
The same Quenda that rejected us because he doesn’t want to play as a wingback?

If we are sticking with this coach then we have to buy a proper right wingback. Amad needs to play in his best position, not shoehorned into a role.
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When did that come to light?
 
We should really only be targeting players that are underperforming their metrics.
 
The Hilton said:
Did you have any thoughts on the rest of the post though? He's better than Garnacho at almost every facet of football, by a significant amount in a lot of cases.
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My thoughts are he's 5 years older than Garnacho (and wasn't as good as Garnacho was at his age) and I don't think one is going to improve and the other might. On that basis I think £62m is way too much.
 
andersj said:
Probably overperforming, but an expectation of close to 10 goals and 10 assist over a season for an attacking midfielder for a team like Wolves? I would argue that is quite good. For a bit better team, that is surely more than twenty. For really good teams? Probably figures similar to where he is today and a player like Saka.
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Again, I think there are enough examples that football just doesn't work like that.
 
SER19 said:
I hear you. But there also just has to be an argument for a manager feeling a player is the best fit. Obviously this very often doesn't work but signings like mane, wijnaldum and salah for pool were probably not top priority among Liverpool fans. When gyokeres went to sporting plenty were probably wondering who he is.

Amorim strikes me as a very very particular manager, similar to Klopp. While I felt ten hag was more motivated by signing players he knew and trusted I get a sense amorim wants an exact type of person in each role. I bloody hope so at least
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There's an irony in this that Klopp wanted Reus and the Liverpool data team said no, Salah is the better player and that's who you're getting :D one of the best transfer decisions ever.
 
He's done well at Wolves but I can't help feeling anxious about this transfer. We seem to almost always get the worst possible version of a player we sign, and in this case Cunha at his worst I can see being pretty terrible... it's a high ceiling, low floor type of move.
 
I'd gladly take him at Liverpool. Think he's top quality and would improve just about any side in the league.
 
“Wolves want payment in full but there is scope for instalments”

Eh?
 
Dion said:
I think that's worth highlighting, for sure. The problem I have with the argument is that he also isn't a prolific creator, which is the other aspect of being a 10. His return for Wolves is kind of what I'm highlighting really, he's scored 26 goals from 17xG and since the start of 2024 he's overperformed his xG by 8.5. He's not an elite finisher, he's just in the form of his life and we need to spend the money knowing that we'll be buying his actual level, which is much lower.

£62m for 10 goals and 5 assists a season if he does well, on a guy who turns 26 in May because his workrate and physicality is good... maybe that's the going rate nowadays and I'm being harsh on him, but it doesn't feel like good business to me.
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Year and a half long purple patch? Hmm, not bad if you ask me. A couple more ´hot streaks´ like that playing for United and 60mil odd wont look that steep.
 
As long as it doesn’t hinder our ability to sign a good striker, I’m all for it. I wouldn’t want it to force us to go for Delap over Gyokeres though for example.
 
Dion said:
Understat has him at 14 goals from 7.16 xG, fbref has him at 14 goals from 7.3xG. Can I politely suggest you might be looking at npxG+xAG (which is 14.1 on fbref and 13.57 on understat)? Either that or FootyStats xG model is absolutely nonsense.

Just to make it absolutely clear though, he is over-performing his xG by double this season according to every reasonable model https://www.instagram.com/officialwhoscored/p/DEKF2w5xrOt/
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So just a question, is it better to underperform xg or overperform? If a player consistently outperforms XG, are they not just a better quality finisher?
 
Dion said:
My thoughts are he's 5 years older than Garnacho (and wasn't as good as Garnacho was at his age) and I don't think one is going to improve and the other might. On that basis I think £62m is way too much.
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Might is doing a lot of heavy lifting there, he'd have to improve a huge amount. How much is your limit for spending on a player who's an upgrade at almost facet of football?

Given you aren't a fan of Cunha, do you have any other suggested targets? I'm certainly not naïve enough to think he's the only target out there, and I'm sure you can't be suggesting Garnacho is good enough at the moment (as evidenced by just how much better Cunha, who you don't rate, is), so I'd be interested to know who you think we should bring in instead and what their selling points are compared to Cunha.
 
Dion said:
I didn't say he was like Elanga as a player, I said they were in similar situations. Cunha is much less pacey than Elanga but he's still a player who does almost all his best work on the transition. Grealish is another example of a player this applies to at the opposite end of the spectrum.

Do we? How many 26 year olds get a big money move and see their goals and assists go up? Grealish is an example above, Lukaku was a bit younger but didn't see an increase when he joined us. Mahrez didn't really score more when he went to City, Neto, Solanke. Those are just a few names off the top of my head from players who moved "up" the Premier League ladder at roughly that age.
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Plenty. Maybe not precisely 26 years of age but Jota, Salah, Mané, Gundogan, Raphinha etc.

I'm not saying it's a universal truth and if somebody is already hitting big figures for say Wolves no you wouldn't expect it to leap up dramatically further.

But are you really saying as a forward it's better to play for a rubbish team over a good team?
 
TRUE NUMBER 9 said:
There was a little interaction between Amorim and Cunha not long after the start of the Utd vs Wolves match. I do not know if many even noticed it, as it was so short but they exchanged smiles and he jokingly threw the ball to a different player when Cunha was right next to him. It might be nothing but it was not the sort of thing you see during a PL game.

Personally, I think he is a very good PL proven level player who fits a genuine need for United. Some question his character, I question the lack of desire from others to have worn the shirt in recent years. He wants to win and you cannot have enough of that in the squad.

Is the quoted price steep? Not when you compare him to Hojlund, Sancho or Antony, three attacking players United have splashed out big money on in recent years that have failed dramatically.

If Cunha arrives at Old Trafford, I will welcome him. The club will still want a genuine striker, ideally Gyökeres. A front line featuring those two would be markedly different to the current attack.
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Can't see how he can say no then. Our RA is a really charming fella!
 
Garethw said:
The same Quenda that rejected us because he doesn’t want to play as a wingback?

If we are sticking with this coach then we have to buy a proper right wingback. Amad needs to play in his best position, not shoehorned into a role.
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Spot on.

Drop Bruno back, buy a striker, and we have four direct threats.
 
HackeyC said:
So just a question, is it better to underperform xg or overperform? If a player consistently outperforms XG, are they not just a better quality finisher?
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That is indeed the question. I think you can only answer if you have several seasons to look at. The likes of Son and Bowen consistently over-perform and it's a fair bet to say they will continue to do so until age or injury kicks in. But would one say Nunez has just been unlucky and will revert to the mean and score more in future, or would one say he's actually just a crap finisher?
 
Brand Nubian said:
Year and a half long purple patch? Hmm, not bad if you ask me. A couple more ´hot streaks´ like that playing for United and 60mil odd wont look that steep.
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Problem is, they don't tend to last much longer than 18 months.
HackeyC said:
So just a question, is it better to underperform xg or overperform? If a player consistently outperforms XG, are they not just a better quality finisher?
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Generally when looking to make signings you want someone who consistently performs at a high xG. Players who over-perform their xG over long periods (eg. multiple seasons) are exceptionally rare. Greizmann, Messi, Kane and Son are the main culprits.
The Hilton said:
Might is doing a lot of heavy lifting there, he'd have to improve a huge amount. How much is your limit for spending on a player who's an upgrade at almost facet of football?

Given you aren't a fan of Cunha, do you have any other suggested targets? I'm certainly not naïve enough to think he's the only target out there, and I'm sure you can't be suggesting Garnacho is good enough at the moment (as evidenced by just how much better Cunha, who you don't rate, is), so I'd be interested to know who you think we should bring in instead and what their selling points are compared to Cunha.
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I don't think might is doing that much heavy lifting for a 20 year old, especially when the player in question we're talking about buying had an even more dramatic improvement.

I'm not a professional scout with a data team to fall back on, so I'm not going to start throwing names out. I'm just not convinced that Cunha is a £60m upgrade on Garancho or that he's nearly as good as he currently appears or that he's going to provide a significant upgrade in all those aspects long term to justify the outlay.
Marwood said:
Plenty. Maybe not precisely 26 years of age but Jota, Salah, Mané, Gundogan, Raphinha etc.

I'm not saying it's a universal truth and if somebody is already hitting big figures for say Wolves no you wouldn't expect it to leap up dramatically further.

But are you really saying as a forward it's better to play for a rubbish team over a good team?
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Jota specifically didn't. Mane, definitely although it took him 3 years. Salah, certainly although he did move leagues. Gundogan changed his position to a more attacking one over the course of years and Raphinha moved leagues (and it also took Raphina 3 seasons and is clearly a bit of a purple patch).

I'm saying for a lot of forwards your individual output is better at teams where all the play runs through you and they play to your style specifically as you're there best player, in a way they won't at another club.
andersj said:
For good players, they very often do.
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Again, I'm just not sure that's all that accurate. I listed examples earlier in the thread.
 
sullydnl said:
Do we think Bruno would play alongside Cunha in the #10 positions, or would signing Cunha see Bruno's primary role shift to CM for next season?
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IF we sign Cunha, I think Bruno moves deepers and Cunha is paired with Amad. Bruno playing as a 6 has been a revelation if I'm honest. He's showing sides to his game that even when he came in and took the EPL by storm, I never thought he had in his locker.

The ability of both Cunha and Amad to beat defenders and the defence splitting passing ability of Bruno behind them could be devastating. We'd just need a really capable striker ahead of them.
 
dubplate warrior said:
He would, surprised at the scepticism on here.
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For me it's just a bit of doubt around his personality. I'd still he excited about the signing.

For some posters though they equate all players with a bit of ego to be the same. So if it worked for Rooney and Cantona it must work for Cunha.

In reality it depends what type of ego problem it is. The most crucial bit, do their teammates like them and despite the ego and temper, are they team players. For Cantona, Rooney and Keane the answer was yes.
 
62m is expensive, but I guess if he can guarantee you 12-15 goals in the premier league that would be around the going rate.
 
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