There's really no viable comparison. Ruud was absolute magic - one the great finishers in the history of the league.
9
Season Average Rating
- Appearances
- 51
- Goals
- 27
- Assists
- 10
- Yellow cards
- 3
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik @Rood and Imran @Annihilate Now! start with the good news by celebrating Manchester United Women's emphatic FA Cup win over Spurs at Wembley and the future of manager Marc Skinner.
Then it's the bad news and the ever worsening form of our Men with losses to Arsenal and Palace.
Finally the main debate - ETH Out now or keep him until the end of the season - if not longer. Are you Team Nik or Team Imran?
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Style wise. Okay. Approach wise, there is. They both mostly the type who need to stay closer to opposition box and relies on service.
Disagree completely. The whole Drogba comparison is very stereotypical to say the least. The way they approach game is different. How their goals span out is different: one is about big match game, big moment while throughout his career doesn't score enough. One put up numbers despite playing for lesser team, but is at the moment found lacking in big games. One love a physical battle with oppisition. One needs to learn how to us even his physique and natural athleticism.
Also Zlatan is not the type you can include in the categories of clinical finisher. Despite the height he reach during his career he is always a wasteful finisher. He is top RVN in scoring out of nothing goal though.
There is no doubt that RVN is the deadliest finisher in the box, however, since his approach to game is limited, he couldn't break away from the pack. His goal scoring rate can be matched.
Edit: and the reason RVN didn't play as much in his last season with us is not just because injury. It was Saha who took his game time and rumor was that SAF actively works to alienate him from the team. This is something usually be seen with players SAF tried to push out of the door.
I personally blame Jose for Lukaku's failure. I think he expected Lukaku to be a player in the mold of the kind of Drogba or Costa or Milito, hard front men, technically sound who frequently make a defender's life hell for 90 minutes. But Lukaku isn't like that, despite his size he isn't the striker in the mold of above mentioned. He has a good left foot and likes classic wingers putting in crosses for him to get at the end of, he isn't a warhorse like Drogba or a constant niggling threat like Milito or Costa. United plays with inverted wingers and expects Lukaku to link up play. He has one of the worst first touches for a striker, and vision is average at best. If United reverts to wing play with classic wingers running down the flanks and putting in crosses, Lukaku will be a huge threat. At Everton he had Coleman, Baines and Deulofeu who used to put in wicked crosses in the box. But we don't have such personnel in the team. Either Jose changes his tactics or start playing Sanchez or Martial as the CF to get more productivity up front.
Those wuppo
Or a rich mans Adie Akinbayi....either way he isn't good enough for Manchester United
What also bothers me with Mourinho is what he sees in his players, he seems to value power and size over other attributes, with mata being an acception. lukaku much like allot of our players its a cycle, rinse, repeat, recycle, they have a few good games, when it comes to the crunch they fold like a team of losers, the manager sticks up for them no matter how poor they playing, they score a few goals, repeat. What also really bothers me with Mourinho even more, he targets the more talented players for much worse scrutiny who are key to our success, and defends the limited players like their his kids, young, fellaini, lukaku, matic has bloody poor for months, and gives the likes of shaw, pogba, martial who are our future of our club far harder treatment. Fact remains lukaku is not good enough for united, and we going to be stuck with this player for 18 months because Jose is that stubborn, begging fellaini to stay, sometimes everything just boggles the mind with Mourinho.
I’d be more concerned if he was ballooning chance after chance over the bar, but his conversion rate is actually very good.
Look at the first half yesterday, we had about two fecking shots in 45 minutes against relegation fodder.
Under Mourinho we just don’t create loads of chances, our attackers feed off scraps.
Look at the first half yesterday, we had about two fecking shots in 45 minutes against relegation fodder.
Under Mourinho we just don’t create loads of chances, our attackers feed off scraps.
Another goal for him, he looks happy again and seems to be enjoying his football.
Are we providing enough chances for him ? No, not really. Then again, it's not all that much of a point either, as it doesn't explain how little he offers as a focal point in the team. That Sanchez ball which had him one on one with their CB pretty much sums it up.
Yep that inability to conjure a shot from anything remotely resembling a half difficult opportunity is part of why his service opportunities are limited. His assist against Burnley put Martial in a similar position to score and everyone agreed it was great service. Put in a similar situation, that opportunity becomes non-service for a limited player.
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It isn't impossible for him to become a better player. I think he just needs to practice practice practice. Even if that means staying behind after training (if he doesn't already). The problem is he might get 25 goals and be happy with that. I hope his desire is to keep on improving as a player.
I think this is the crux of the matter. Hes a very clinical finisher and usually puts them away when he gets those kind of chances. Hes also big and strong, but despite that his hold up play is not really that good and hes not the kind of player that creates opportunities on his own. Hes not the kind of player that i think "something is going to happen now" if he has the ball at 25 yards.
It may sound harsh, but we need more than our striker simply being a clinical goal scorer. Especially since hes is playing alone up top
People have different opinions, you must respect different opinions. Lukaku has a lot of weakness and need to improve, people who want to defend him need to accept the criticism especially the guy has only scored 2 goals against top 10 sides.
I swear some on here must be disappointed every time he scores a goal.
He literally did exactly that against Spurs ffs. A hopeful ball over the top and he held off two defenders to get a shot in (well saved at the near post). His previous league goal was the same. A pass fired into his midriff, which he controlled and (again) held off two defenders before scoring.
There’s enough legitimate reasons to criticise him, it speaks volumes that some of you cnuts also feel the need to make some fictional reasons up too.
Very good finish to break the deadlock against the Hudd at the weekend. He is doing the business... IMO we could shape up the attack better to feed him more often.
One thing you can't question is his desire. Have no doubt that he's an absolute trier and will do all he can to make it here and be a success.. that's why it surprises me when people question his mentality as that isn't the issue. Nor does he miss loads of opportunities.. he's a solid finisher imo but is more about whether he has the capacity to improve his game leaps and bounds inspite of his desire to do so. Sometimes you can have all the will in the world but there are certain factors out of your control. His hold up play is very streaky even against weak opposition.. some games he looks okay and others downright awful and big games - non existent tbh. I think I wouldn't mind having him as a backup striker but as the leading man long term, that's where I have question marks. He will score plenty inspite of his flaws, have no doubt about that but we need to look at the bigger picture and unless his game kicks on next season we aren't winning a major trophy.
It's very simple to say give him more service or look he's scoring goals - people used to make the same excuses for Rooney even though a lot of us were saying look he's clearly past his peak and holding us back. You have to look at the fluidity of the attack as a whole.
I think there is more than an element of truth in what he says. He doesn't get many shots off from distance at all, score from distance or really have good ability to create those little openings to do so, especially since he has been at United and has to face packed defences. If you watch the likes of Aguero or Kane they do this a lot. I think it is probably because his build means he lacks the agility of explosiveness of those players, Kane being agile for his size and Aguero being explosive.
The main problem I have with Lukaku is his movement or rather lack thereof at times. However this is a side of his game that can improve. We have a bigger problem in that we don't create enough clear chances for him and don't play to his strength which is running onto a ball in space. He thrived early on when we had a free flowing attack and created plenty.
There're just not many great pure strikers around, I mean look at the other top 6:
Manchester City - Still depends heavily on Aguero who was signed in 2011. Jesus is good but missed lots of games due to injury.
Liverpool - How man strikers they bought and failed?! Now they play with a false 9.
Chelsea - Their 2 strikers now were both bench options in their previous club. Conte also uses Hazard a lot as a false 9.
Tottenham - won the lottery with Kane and all their purchases in that position haven't been really success.
Arsenal - Wenger upgraded on his 50m striker within 6 months.
I'm looking at top scorers table in other european leagues and I see abundance of players who failed spectacularly with other teams, mainly in the premier league. There's always a big risk with signing strikers and I'm not sure you could find a pure No. 9 who would perform better than Lukaku. I'm not actually defending Lukaku here. I think the attack needs to be more fluid and cohesive and to have someone who is more involved in the buildup if we want to perform in the big games consistently and compete for titles. And Lukaku is unfortunately not a player who could do that consistently. It's definitely worth a try to put Sanchez up top and Martial on the left with Pogba just behind them against other top 6 teams. That won't happen though because I don't believe Mourinho is ready yet to drop Lukaku in big games.
Manchester City - Still depends heavily on Aguero who was signed in 2011. Jesus is good but missed lots of games due to injury.
Liverpool - How man strikers they bought and failed?! Now they play with a false 9.
Chelsea - Their 2 strikers now were both bench options in their previous club. Conte also uses Hazard a lot as a false 9.
Tottenham - won the lottery with Kane and all their purchases in that position haven't been really success.
Arsenal - Wenger upgraded on his 50m striker within 6 months.
I'm looking at top scorers table in other european leagues and I see abundance of players who failed spectacularly with other teams, mainly in the premier league. There's always a big risk with signing strikers and I'm not sure you could find a pure No. 9 who would perform better than Lukaku. I'm not actually defending Lukaku here. I think the attack needs to be more fluid and cohesive and to have someone who is more involved in the buildup if we want to perform in the big games consistently and compete for titles. And Lukaku is unfortunately not a player who could do that consistently. It's definitely worth a try to put Sanchez up top and Martial on the left with Pogba just behind them against other top 6 teams. That won't happen though because I don't believe Mourinho is ready yet to drop Lukaku in big games.
He's on course to get 30 goals in all competitions this season. And I'll be very happy with that return, especially when we have other players such as Martial and Lingard chipping in regularly.
Lukaku is over his 'drought' now IMHO
Lukaku is over his 'drought' now IMHO
fair enough@Stacks and others who had a go at his poor pass completion percentage against top 6,
here is the breakdown.
Good enough pass completion on the ground, it's the headers that will bring his completion percentage to very poor state.
Just shows that playing long-ball with Lukaku isn't going to be as effective for him, the only time it did was when we beat Spurs at home (as he got an assist) but apart from one time it's not been the way to go.@Stacks and others who had a go at his poor pass completion percentage against top 6,
here is the breakdown.
Good enough pass completion on the ground, it's the headers that will bring his completion percentage to very poor state.
I remember games where Smalling and McNair bossed Lukaku (at Everton) playing this way against us, and truth being told he looked terrible. So it shouldn't be a shock when the same is happening for us. Need to change our approach so much in these bigger games but easier said than done when defenders who aren't comfortable against the press have to play against it.
Exactly. Against City it was atrocious, nearly 20 long balls and IIRC he completed 2-3 passes.
Is this even a problem? We have Lingard, Martial, Rashford and Sanchez all capable of scoring worldies or goals out of nothing. We have Mata and Pogba who can score from set pieces. Why does it even matter if one player can't but can score almost every other type of goal?
If he wants to be a very top bracket forward he needs to score more goals for Manchester United. He needs to start scoring against top sides in big games too. To do that he is going to have to create some goals out of very little.
He is scoring goals. He has lots of assists. I am very happy with him. He only needs goals in big matches. He is getting too much stick here.
And in the big matches, we are not really helping him.
Despite everyone's moaning would you swap him for Lacazette or Morata? No you wouldn't.
You wouldn’t but he did cost more than them.
I’d be surprised if many players had “accurate” heading stats. Winning a header and actually getting some accuracy to find a team mate are entirely different things.@Stacks and others who had a go at his poor pass completion percentage against top 6,
here is the breakdown.
Good enough pass completion on the ground, it's the headers that will bring his completion percentage to very poor state.
Not by very much. He's the best we could have got in the summer and he's got figures to back that up. At only 24 people like you need to give him a break.
Should he be scoring more? He has completely been left behind in the race for the golden boot and I'm sure that would've been one of Lukaku's personal ambitions at the start of the season. 12 goals isn't enough when you consider he had 7 in 7 or something like that by the end of September.
As soon as Pogba came back from Injury, our tactics changed and he started scoring again.
When Pogba was injured we played a lot of hoofball; which Lukaku is not good at.
Nope, but he's currently closer to their level than he is the likes of Kane/Aguero/Salah. Going on this season's form, Lukaku is very much the best of the rest behind the elite tier of PL strikers.
I posted this in the the fixture thread, but since scoring 7 in the first month and a half of our PL campaign, he's managed 5 goals. If you include February, he's scored a goal a month in the league for us since the end of September. For a £75m+ striker, that's nowhere near good enough. Aguero has pretty much managed to score as many PL goals as Lukaku has in the last 5 months today.
That might be so but Aguero and Kane weren't available in the summer. Out of who we could get we got the best. 19 goals this season so far and his build up play and assists are much improved.
75m is a second tier striker in the market. That is what Lukaku is. But we can win stuff with second tier strikers, we have done so before.
Overall his numbers have been disappointing to a degree. After the great start I thought he'll be at 25-26 goals in all competitions by now like what Salah, Kane and Aguero have achieved.
He's having a decent season, not great but decent. I'll say 6.5 or 7/10. Plenty of time to improve many things though.
He's having a decent season, not great but decent. I'll say 6.5 or 7/10. Plenty of time to improve many things though.
Jesus christ he's at 19 goals in 36 games! Thats more than 'decent'.
The only game you can say he really cost us points was City. Next year he will be even better when the team goes up another level.
Compared to what Salah, Kane and Aguero have already managed to score, decent is the right word to describe his season. He scored good number of goals, so it's not a bad season, but he's far away from those 3, so can't say great at all tbh.
I love him but that's fair judgement.
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