We all judged Rashford for playing amazing last year because… wait for it… he scored a lot of goals. He wasn’t running more or pressing more effectively than he is this season in my opinion, he was just making better attacking decisions to get in better positions to score, whilst also being more clinical. This season he hasn’t scored anywhere near the same amount of GOALS, and rightly so, his performances have been seriously questioned as a result as that is what he offers to the team, goals.
He is meant to be one of main goal scorers in the team alongside Højlund, so yes, if we are HYPOTHETICALLY talking about selling Rashford and looking for Garnacho to replace his role as one of the main goal scorers in the side, then yes, there would be an expectation for Garnacho to continue his progression, step up and aim to score 15 prem goals. I’m almost certain he will st himself that target next year anyway, he just seems like that type of lad.
I get the overall sentiment that the team scoring, performing and getting results is the most important thing, of course it is. But we’re talking about an individual here and for me Garnacho is looking like more of a goal scoring wide player than a more creative wide player like a Grealish or Doku, whose focus is not all about goals or even assists necessarily. My hope is he develops his game to do a bit of both, like a Saka type forward. That’s the ideal type of forward considering we have a pure no. 9 now in Hojlund who also needs feeding.