You can say it's statistically highly unlikely, and depending on what your tolerances are maybe you personally can rule it out, but you can't actually generally rule it out. In this case, it makes zero sense to basically rule out Cunha as a great finisher because he has been so good this season, which a lot of people seem to be eager to do. Predictive statistics are designed to make educated decisions about the future, not to state absolutes about things that haven't happened yet.
Matheus Cunha £62.5m release clause | Not a striker
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Nik (@Rood) and Imran (@Annihilate Now!) discuss United's fantastic win away against Athletic Club in the semi-final of the Europa League.
They also pick out the positives of United's 4-3 loss away at Brentford, and Nik reviews a day out at Old Trafford watching Manchester United Women qualify for the Champions League.
Everything we say with certainty is based on tolerance limits. It's beyond spurious to argue that that isn't effectively ruling it out.
You're inventing your own arguments here.
You can rule out Cunha being as good as he has been this season, because nobody is, over any sustained period. That's not the same as saying he's not a good finisher.
STOP DATA ANALYSIS CHAT
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Right, data analysis in this topic is now done. If you wish to talk about data analysis as a seperate topic go and create a thread in the general forum and have at it. Stop disrupting every transfer thread with this now.
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What about hypothesis tests?
Yeah and as you say it’s not an exact plug in and play situation but theoretically they can give us 20 goals between them maybe more.
That probably won’t be enough to win anything major, but it should be enough to make our league position much more respectable.
I’m not joking anymore
Plus with both being good ball carriers (something we lack) it would hopefully help bail us out of sustained pressure more often. So, as vital as improving the goal tally is, it's more than just that. I feel like we concede a lot of late goals or equalisers because we end up with no outlet on the pitch you can just give the ball so they can buy you 40 yards of territory, a free kick, or generally a break from defending. Defending is hard when nothing you hit upfield sticks and it just keeps coming back at you.
Cunha especially gets fouled a bunch, so we can rack up a new set-piece barren spell in no time. Or he'll suddenly stop winning fouls for some reason.
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Agreed.
It does make me wonder how much of a difference our basketball style games under Ten Hag would have been with more competent ball carriers/hold up play from our CF.
For one thing our defenders would have had such players to train against. As much as the amount of space we left open was systemic, it couldn't have hurt if the players committed to the rest defence didn't look genuinely shocked whenever an attacker ran at them.
Our bigger problem in that respect is that nobody we have gets the ball into those ball carriers quickly in space behind the opposition midfielders. It's much easier to carry the ball or hold the ball up when the opposition midfield is playing running back to their own goal rather than set in front of the defence.
It's one of my worries for Cunha in our team, we're slow out of the back and playing through the press. He's not going to get many of those chances to carry directly against the back line where he's so dangerous at United. He's not going to be able to carry it back to front on his own (and you don't want him coming that deep to do it, really)
It's one of my worries for Cunha in our team, we're slow out of the back and playing through the press. He's not going to get many of those chances to carry directly against the back line where he's so dangerous at United. He's not going to be able to carry it back to front on his own (and you don't want him coming that deep to do it, really)
Will worry about it IF he signs
Yeah this is my main concern with him. If you watch a compilation of his goals and assists they largely come in transition which is no surprise as Wolves rely heavily on the counter. That simply will not translate with us.
You pay a lot more to have that kind of goal output potential in one player though. One forward scoring 20 goals a season is worth a lot more than two who score ten each. So you should pay less total for the two players. But anyway, just taking into account goals scored misses a lot of other factors.
Cool
Alternative strategy: Bring Antony back and use Cunha as a 9. Would save a lot of money and allow us to go after a CM, WB, and/or keeper.
Meh he’s not a 9. We need a focal point who can hold the ball up and bring others into play.
So do I. It would also somewhat offset buying Delap since he wouldn't be thrown into the deep end right away if Cunha was the featured player.
I know he's doing well at Betis, but I really don't think we should be bringing Antony back. If we can get good money for him, we should take it. Cunha as a 9 could work, I suppose. Still think I'd prefer combining him with a Gyokeres/Ekitike/David though. Feels like a waste of his carrying ability and I'm not sure if his off the shoulder runs are as good as the others mentioned.
I suspect Amad won't be healthy all year (just a hunch!), so having Amad and Antony available over a potential 60 fixture match calendar would be useful.
That's a reasonable concern, but we'll still have Garnacho, Cunha, Zirkzee and Bruno who could fill in there. Could maybe throw Mainoo in there too, though I wouldn't be surprised if we're considering selling him tbh.
Yeah desperately need a focal point
Wait til you see Delap in that setup.
Suddenly it seems a decent idea.
Delap up top with Cunha left and one of Garnacho or Amad right would be better.
I really want us to bring in a line-leading striker. Forget saving money for a CM or wingback.
So do I, but I'm not remotely convinced Delap would be good enough. He's the sort of player one buys to compliment an already established striker, not as a featured striker. If Delap is our only option then we may simply better off saving the money and keeping Hojlund. Or maybe going after Jonathan David, Sesko, or a similar alternative.
Cunha really, really struggled as a striker in a pair at Atletico, let alone leading the line. Feels like it would be a massive mistake to play him there.
Please don't keep the money we need a striker desperately
If INEOS think a staring lineup anything like this is going to drastically improve United’s 15th/16th place then we really are screwed.
Garnacho - Cunha - Amad
——— Bruno - Ugarte
Garnacho - Cunha - Amad
——— Bruno - Ugarte
Surely it will more likely be Amad RWB. Cunha and Garnacho behind Gyokeres if we get CL football.
I don’t think Amorim will. He’s smart enough to know he suits the 10 better and is familiar with that role at wolves. That’s probably the reason we’re being linked with him aswell as Delap… so we want Cunha and a ST
We need to sell Antony while he’s coming of the back of a good loan spell. If we keep him and he fails again then his price tag reduces again and he’ll start to look like he can only play in the Spanish league which narrows down the clubs who can buy him or will buy him
No that makes 0 sense.
He's not being headhunted to cover the #9 position. Looks more like this could be the forward positions:
----------------------- Delap ------------------------
------------- Cunha --------- Bruno -------------
- Dorgu ---------------------------------- Amad -
------------- ( ? ) --------- Ugarte -------------
But ideally would prefer:
--------------------- Gyokeres ---------------------
------------- Cunha --------- Bruno -------------
- Dorgu ---------------------------------- Amad -
----------- Ederson --------- Ugarte -----------
Is it in euros like the fee that everyone keeps mentioning.
Slightly better but let’s be honest that would be lucky to get into the top half.
But this is the Cunha thread so I won’t start moaning about the squad.
YES! buy him for the left sided attacker…no more talk about him as a CF
Don't see Gyokeres happening by Ruben's words, in terms of Cunha would be a quality signing but need much more
It will likely work with CF Infront and back 4 but will need a better holding midfielder.
Just add Dorgu, the three centre backs fit that month, and whichever striker you want to punish yourself with and it's Amorim's 523 again, but with Cunha. That's double the match winners, to be fair.