Cavani, Hit or Big Hit?

Falcow

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As a backup striker he’s been fine. As a starting striker he’s done nowhere near enough....although none of our other strikers have either which is just weird.

He’s been praised to the hilts by pundits, which is bizarre, but always the case with these types of players.

For me his movement in the box is good but he isn’t scoring goals. Other than that we are a better team when he isn’t playing because when he plays our other forwards have to play like wingers and we lose a lot of dynamism.

I couldn’t say he’s been a missive hit or miss....just meh overall.
I'm in this category. His build up play is very poor which disappoints me. He doesnt gold the ball up well at all and given his main attribute is scoring goals he has missed a few sitters most notably against Arsenal.

Overall though I like him and his workrate. Seems to be a fairly humble guy despite all he has achieved.
 

Doracle

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He’s done well as a backup striker but isn’t at the level Martial was at last season. Not his fault though that Martial has had an awful season and Cavani has therefore become our first choice. Hit.
 

Rustyspider13

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Hit for me as a backup striker, which is precisely what he was supposed to do. He has missed a few good chances but we already knew that he isn't a 1 chance 1 goal striker. And he's scored two very important goals. He and Bruno as the front two gives us a relentless pressing option as well.
 

Dr Foo

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But that’s really down to the drop in form of Martial rather than brilliant performances from Cavani. I mean he deserves credit for plugging the hole, but no one expected Martial’s from to dive so dramatically. The fact remains, Martials performances last season eclipse anything Cavani has done in a Utd shirt, by a big distance.
Agree, that's my point, hence what I meant by it's a glaring indictment (of martial this season). Cavani is plugging the gap well but we need a prime, younger version of him to really challenge
 

AFC NimbleThumb

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Hit but it feels 6-7 years too late.

His movement is unbelievable but him being such a stand out in certain games shows how below par our attack has been this season.

Would be an even bigger hit if our front 3 were firing like last season & he was an over qualified back up.
 

RedIan

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A complete hit, weighed in with some crucial goals, his work rate has surprised me, a real grafter. Puts martial to shame.
 

Mickeza

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Depends how you look at it. Great value signing on a free transfer who has been a good addition to the squad. Is he good enough to be the main man in a side looking to win a title? No. And that’s what we need. It’s more a failure on Martial’s part though as I don’t think Cavani was signed to be that person.
 

Wilt

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Understandably not the striker he once was, but in terms of bringing experience, energy and enthusiasm he’s a definite hit.
 

Beachryan

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Pretty much same for me.

He’s quite clearly got major quality in his movement and he’s an absolute classic no.9, but at the end of the day, he’s 34 years old with 7 goals in all competitions. Wouldn’t say he’s been a hit, but definitely wouldn’t say he’s been a miss yet.
This is the right take. I've no idea why pundits are raving over his movement, nous, drive and so forth when we're not actually playing that well for 2 months of him leading the line now.

He's fine. If he were a 25 year old first team purchase bought to replace our 70m striker, we'd all be apoplectic.

This should just highlight how poor our club is run. There are probably 12 clubs in the league with a better CF than the club that has spent the second most.
 

GlasgowCeltic

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Great pro, you can see why he's had the career he's had, but also why he never made it to be a line leader at the elite clubs
 

Maticmaker

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For a 34 yr old, with a world class CF reputation, who has 'been there, done, that and has umpteen 'T' shirts to prove it' Cavani shows more enthusiasm, energy and willingness to move to create space and time, than a number of other players ( including some youngsters who have been on our books). He always seems to put in a shift. Maybe he has perhaps lost a little, in terms in his penalty box sharpness, but he has still performed way above my expectations.

As others have noted, I too was expecting another Falcao but have been more than presently surprised, definitely a hit for me!
 

UnrelatedPsuedo

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Comes in as a squad filler. Makes most fans agree he should start when fit enough.

He’s a great signing. Not really up for debate unless your expectations were crazy high.
 

harms

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I don’t see anything that Fergie said that’s different to barely touching the ball or only scoring one (league) goal.

There was never any doubting his attitude and the fact that he was popular in the dressing room is unsurprising. I would also have been willing to see him stay and give him time to turn from a miss to a hit, but he didn’t.
“He’s an extreme miss” and what Fergie (and all of the players) said of him seem like the pretty much opposite assessments to me.
 

Castia

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Huge hit

Been much better than I was expecting tbh, his movement off the ball is unmatched and offers us something Martial/Rashford or Greenwood doesn’t.

Good signing in my opinion.
 

Luffy

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He is doing okay. I like his attitude. Could do with more goals. But he helps the team enough.
 

Leftback99

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Neither really. Depends how much we're paying him. He seems to have become a bit overrated on here, seemingly because many don't like Martial. The Southampton game was an important contribution but other than that he hasn't done that much.
 

Mart1974

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Miss? Don't let the long hair fool you...
 

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Clear hit. Doing exactly what he was bought to do and more. Unfortunately other players are having such a drastic downturn that we are needing more.
 

MattofManchester

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A 33 year old player comes in, who hasn't trained in about a year, and immediately takes the place of your main forward, and you're calling it a miss????
 

sullydnl

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He essentially replaced Ighalo in our squad and is an obvious upgrade there, actually being able to immediately compete for the starting spot. We're certainly much better off having signed him that we would be if we didn't. And his attitude is obviously very good too. So, on those terms, a hit.

However, it's indicative of the problem we have in that position when bringing in an aging Cavani to compete with or usurp an extremely lacklustre Martial in the way a past his best Odion Ighalo wasn't able to is the hit move we made.
 

Brwned

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Hit or miss seems a pointless classification given the wide ranging opinions on him from the outset. A lot of people considered his signing an embarrassment, an inevitable flop. Others thought it was great we finally have a world class forward, even if it’s a bit late in the day. Even if everyone judged his performances identically, there’d be no consensus on how much of a success he was.

I like him but find a lot of the recent commentary on him a bit weird, someone last week mentioned him as our second most important player, a real difference maker, the kind a team struggles without. English pundits love a workhorse.
 

saivet

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He's been okay. I feel that Martial's horrendous form has made some overrate some of his performances.
 

OL29

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Does it feck, who are you considering top reds then, name them @OL29? Are they also the same bunch that won't hear a single drop of criticism about the manager?
I’m not going to start listing names but there’s definitely a segment of this fanbase who are extra harsh on a certain profile of player. They tend to be very vocal in their criticism of the fancy foreigner type whilst pleading patience for the so called less fashionable players.
Everyone’s entitled to their own opinion on players but it’s the hypocrisy that bothers me.
 
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I’m not going to start listing names but there’s definitely a segment of this fanbase who are extra harsh on a certain profile of player. They tend to be very vocal in their criticism of the fancy foreigner type whilst pleading patience for the so called less fashionable players.
Everyone’s entitled to their own opinion on players but it’s the hypocrisy that bothers me.
Of course a part of every fan base will prefer a workhorse over a languid player and vice versa, whether it's Berbatov, Martial, Zlatan, Pogba, Park, Fletcher etc etc etc.

What the hell does that have to do with "top red" though? That's just a completely natural thing you expect.
 

OL29

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Of course a part of every fan base will prefer a workhorse over a languid player and vice versa, whether it's Berbatov, Martial, Zlatan, Pogba, Park, Fletcher etc etc etc.

What the hell does that have to do with "top red" though? That's just a completely natural thing you expect.
That’s all well and good but it doesn’t really justify the double standard.
Take this thread as an example, the OP was very vocal about the abuse of certain players, while he himself is happy to ridicule other players who are deemed to be a fair target. It’s plain old hypocrisy and there’s loads of that type on this forum and amongst this fanbase.
And I don’t really buy the workrate excuse because the criticisms go well beyond that. The constant downplaying and discrediting, and questioning of character is where it goes too far for me.
 

Mike Smalling

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You would have to be borderline insane to call him a miss. He was brought in on a free to provide some depth and different options in attack, but has turned out to be our most effective number 9. Seven goals so far is a pretty decent return as well, and most of them have been important goals. On top of that he should be a great inspiration for our younger players with his professionalism and work rate, and more specifically has hopefully shown Rashford, Martial and Greenwood the value of good movement in the box. Maybe the linkup play has been a bit up and down, but that is certainy also the case for all our other options.
 

Manncunian

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I know as a newbie I’m supposed to be diplomatic and reasonable. Not to be overly critical of other posters.

But, my god, this is embarrassing from the OP. What have you been smoking?! :D
 

The Corinthian

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He's great - definite hit.

The fact that we can put a ball in the box and have a number 9 score a goal out of it is something we've lacked for a while. Even Lukaku didn't offer that headed threat.

So, big hit, and for me should be starting any game he's available for.