That sounds good until you realise that’s in all competitions. For me the real barometer will always be the Premier League. If we’re looking at PL goals, then Martial has 4 in 19 and Rashford has 8 in 24.
The reason I care about Premier League goals is because knockout competitions discourage low-blocks and playing for draws. Also, the PL will always be the hardest test a player faces, even compared with Champions League football nowadays.
I’m interested in how many PL points we can accumulate and we see time and time again we struggle against deep defences.
Rashford has averaged 0.31 goals per game and Martial 0.34, across a period of about 150 league games each. It’s not brilliant, especially at a club like Utd were we have most of the ball and do most of the attacking in a game.
For comparison, the like of Aguero, Salah and Kane average over 0.6 goals per game.
Callum Wilson averages a similar number to Rashford and Martial playing for Bournemouth and Newcastle.
I wonder if the numbers for the 3 you listed would look the same though if you looked at their stats from when they were the same age as Rashford is now.
You also have to take into account the supply line at Liverpool and City, the former have the two best attacking fullbacks in Europe and we know Guardiola's teams are always loaded with creators. Where as at United we have Shaw who is on his first great attacking season, AWB, Fred and McTominay.
I'm not saying Rashford doesn't need to improve, in fact the opposite, but I do think the idea of buying new attackers being the answer is kinda like adding a spoiler and roof snorkle to your supercar while the transmission is broken.
I'm not actually one of those that think Rashford is so rubbish he can't play for us, his numbers are good. I do however think we should have a quality CF and a Martial replacement so we're not relying too much on Rashford as although his numbers are good, his play and form is really frustrating.
I agree there is an issue between our defence and attack, of course, but I also feel if we had forwards making more intelligent runs and a better understanding in general of that position we'd be in better shape. Rashford is a danger but always has his head down and seems to run blindly so I'd love to see that start to disappear from his game. Martial just has got to be phased out now on current form, how much longer do we wait for him? It's fine for forwards to have off spells but he is the other way round. Months of average with spells of good. That's wrong.
Well I think you'll likely get part of what you want in the summer in Sancho, but the striker situation wont change soon imo as there's nobody to get, look at Barca, Juve and Real all using old #9's or no #9 as the only 2 standout candidates are both unobtainable at the moment.
The thing is I often see good runs being ignored in this team, Van de Beek wasn't great the other night but there were several times where he moved into space and called for the ball only for it to go backwards or sideways, same yesterday with Cavani and Bruno, they made runs but Fred and McTominay either couldn't make the pass or didn't attempt it, which isn't on them, they know their limitations, but for a forward it must be demoralising knowing that no matter how clever a run you make the ball is unlikely to come. I think Ole is giving Martial plenty of chances right now and if it keeps going as it is he might well be able to sell him this summer to boost our transfer kitty.