The other side of that coin is the pressure of playing at United is infinitely more than playing for Ipswich. This as we've seen lately, can have a negative effect on a players confidence and ability to score goals. Delap strikes me as the sort of player one adds to a big club to compliment an already successful striker situation (think Alan Smith or Chicharito), instead of asking them to be the primary contributor of goals. That is potentially, a massive recipe for disaster.
Liam Delap | £30m release clause?
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The other side of that coin is the pressure of playing at United is infinitely more than playing for Ipswich. This as we've seen lately, can have a negative effect on a players confidence and ability to score goals. Delap strikes me as the sort of player one adds to a big club to compliment an already successful striker situation (think Alan Smith or Chicharito), instead of asking them to be the primary contributor of goals. That is potentially, a massive recipe for disaster.
Also the play style differences matter. I think if you put Hojlund in a lower pressure situation like Ipswich and basically just counter attack the full game every single fixture, he'd do alright.
For sure, I just think it's less of a risk becaus we could afford Cunha as well, with delap. I would have more faith in Delap just repeating his output from this season and Cunha also contributing, than just banking on Gyokeres to hit the ground running (I have my own reservations about him anyway). I just don't think we can get Gyokeres and Cunha without selling, which by then they both could have moved on.
Yeah, that's the frustration. I think we need both Cunha and Gyökeres. If we somehow managed to sign them both (we'd have to get Champions League), then I think we could compete for the top 5 next season. Especially so, if we could upgrade one or two other areas after a few sales. Unfortunately, I feel that although Cunha and Delap obviously represent an improvement, it's just not significant enough in my view. I could be wrong on Gyökeres, but I just think he'll be an absolute monster for whoever is fortunate enough to sign him.
Hey, maybe we'll be surprised and we'll find some cash from somewhere or we win the Europa and cash isn't as big of a problem. Delap now supposedly seeing if we get into Europe could make him less likely, becuase if we get in CL, we probably do go for Gyokeres. If we could secure Delap and Cunha before we know our european fate, I think you have to do that. Rather than waiting and if you don't get europe, end up scraping the barrel.
Would be very tough on Delap if he's brought in to lead the line as our main striker. It would be his second season in the premier league which is often a lot more difficult for young strikers. He's not an unknown quantity, defenders know what to expect. Coming into an attacking unit that will be much changed and very much still finding it's feet.
It's asking a lot.
It's asking a lot.
Will be interesting to see how it all plays out. There's a world where we sign neither Gyökeres or Delap. That may even be the likely scenario. At least we seem to have Cunha in the bag already.
Out of curiosity, how many league goals would Delap have to score for us next season before people thought "good buy"?
Obviously it doesn’t matter because of the clause but prices down the leagues have gone crazy too. Birmingham paid 15m for a player to play L1
It’s not just that, suddenly he’s got 75,000 watching his every move; an audience of hundreds of millions; a pressure he’s never ever had an inkling of; deeper backlines and an attack doesn’t revolve around him, plus no mentor and nobody to switch in/out with.
People seem to disregard all of that or believe it’ll come easy to him to adapt to being catapulted into a different stratosphere.
Hojlund just crashed and burned under the spotlight, so the logical thing is to put another barely proven youngster under the exact same level of scrutiny as successor.
He'd have to replicate this season in the prem for me and keep the all round play I've seen him do this season. All comps he should be hitting 20.
This isn't unique to Delap though, this could easily happen to Gyokeres who's never played in a top 4 league, or under any pressure either.
Unless you’re dealing with a prodigy, it is more likely due to age - experience counts for a lot, especially in handling hardships and setbacks. One has also played in front of 50,000 every home game whilst the other is around 30,000. Sometimes that counts for something depending on the constitution of the player. One also has CL experience and international caps, which adds a multiplier (or 2).
And no, it’s not unique to any player making the step up, but what is is not having mentors. Even the most elite prospects have those typically. We’re providing someone with no experience, no mentor. Again. Even Rooney and Ronaldo were immediately sponsored by vets in their roles.
There’s only 3 players with more than 20 PL goals this season, and they’d cost you £150m each (if Salah was in his prime). 20+ goal scorers are difficult to find and they typically cost a bomb.
And Hojlund is a flop largely because of his performances this year, not last year.
Amorim's quote should also apply to Delap
That's normally the target when you sign a striker. Question is who is more likely to be capable of it - the player who scored loads, but in Portugal and in the best team in the league, or a player who scored a very good amount of goals for a very bad side in the Premier League, so he's already quite capable even if he doesn't have the same numbers.
I don't think there's a clear answer at all, even for the short term. That's why we have the likes of Wilcox and co...
That's fine. Like I said - that's why we brought in the experts to are supposed to be able to evaluate those things.
Well you can also look at it as we won't even get Delap without winning the Europa League. We are going to have to pitch the history of the club and our plans to get back to the top to whomever we try to sign as anyone that we are interested in will likely have offers from clubs that can offer European football and a better chance of trophies in the short term.
Cunha seems to be a great example of the right signing as much as anything because of his desire to play for the club despite having interest from the likes of Newcastle, Villa and Arsenal. I don't want to come off as a passion merchant or Roy Keane banging on endlessly about character and fight but by God do we need a squad that wants to be here for the right reasons and will give everything they have got every time they play.
We need just under £45 million for Hojlund to comply with PSR in regards to his fee from Atalanta, £20 million would mean a £25 million loss which is massive with our PSR issues so we’re stuck with Hojlund which is why an experienced striker rather than another project striker is needed.
He seems to have a bit more bite to him than Hojlund but would he be another striker who overly focused on tussling with CBs?
Nah I don't think he would be focused on that
For me its more of a concern that, while better than Hojlund at it, he doesnt seem to have a great amount of success either
I have no problem with a striker doing it but Maguire is very comfortable against him, both in physical confrontations and dealing with him running at him
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Assuming he starts most PL games (30+) I think if he were to be around 12+ in the league that would be a decent return. Not world class but “good buy” territory for £30m.
So roughly:
G<10 - Bad
10-12 OK
13-15 Good
16-18 Very good
18+ Outstanding
Purely considering age and transfer fee.
Can't believe how so many think that £30m are peanuts. Most teams from other leagues have never paid that amount. Guirassy went to Dortmund for half that amount, Thuram went to Inter for free, Hugo Ekitite cost Frankfurt €16,50m when he joined from PSG, etc. I'm not saying we can find cheaper alternatives within the EPL, but it doesn't make this transfer a good deal if he only becomes "decent". Better pay a bit more for a more prolific CF then.
£30m is what you would expect for a 22 year old CF who has 12 PL goals.
Comparing players in the Bundesliga to PL is not apples to apples.. we have seen plenty players score goals in the Bundesliga and fail in the PL, Werner, Havertz, Sancho as prime examples.
The poster said £30m for a player that scores 12 Pl goals is decent... he is obviously going to improve as well.
There are better players for free, why pay 40m euros if he is "decent".
Isn't this exactly what Amorim alluded to in his press conference yesterday, regarding players wanting to play for United and not specific competitions?
European football
He should be thankful someone will come and get him from the championship. Scored 10 goals and he think he is RVP.
European football
He should be thankful someone will come and get him from the championship. Scored 10 goals and he think he is RVP.
Of course he's going to want European football, he's obviously good enough to. That's why multiple clubs at that level are trying to sign him.
You not rating him doesn't mean he has to be an idiot and act like he doesn't have his choice of clubs. As per Ornstein, literally half the teams in the league along with multiple European teams are interested in him.
Why do they keep saying want to play European football? So they would join Forest or Lille instead of us? Is European football just code for City, Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Real, PSG, Barca, Bayern?
How dare he have ambition.
We should be expecting a solid first team or at least a rotation player capable of playing 30-35 games a season for that kind of money but because how utterly dreadful our transfers have been over the years, we’ve come to somehow accept that £30m is fair for a punt that may or may not work out, and it’s acceptable to fill your squad with £50m squad players.
We haven’t bought many players in the last 8-10 years that would have meaningfully outperformed their price tag. Low single digits.
15 for good. 20 for great. 20+ he gets a statue.
Yup. Spending horrible amount of money on poor players is the biggest reason where the club is now. Dorgu seems to be another flop in the making.
And with him we’ve also convinced ourselves that the fee was adequate for a long shot punt.
I think its a weird thing to want, when they're going to be earning plenty of money if they come here. Even if its less than we were offering last summer and previously... Having a moral stance that players have to want to come to the club, not wanting to play in certain bigger competitions, when its not going to be a moral move anyway when they sign here and get a massive pay raise. It just feels like a hollow argument and honestly, I'd rather players have the highest of ambitions because nobody is going to get there without working hard. Someone who doesnt have those ambitions might not work as hard.
Preferring our transfer targets choose other teams is certainly a take ngl
Which I find alarming.
It's just the usual dressing up of the fact that most players sign for money or glory and it's nearly always the former with us. Everyone always pretends it's our pull as a 'big' club because it's a better narrative and the player can't directly say otherwise.
Of course if he decides to go elsewhere we'll also leak that we decided we didn't want him anyway.
It would actually have saved us from making so many mistakes.