There is an argument to say that our attack need more urgent addressing than our midfield

[George The Best]

I agree with the OP’s point. We are way too light up front. We need at least one more attacking player, for injury cover at least.

if we get FDJ then great for midfield, but that wasn’t our main problem today. Thought McFred were good today. We should have scored from the chances we created - which just leads me to believe we are going to play Ronnie.

 

[Cloud7]

Yeah it's quite a debacle up top. We have Rashford who hasn't looked good in over a year, Martial who hasn't looked good in over a year, a 37 (?38) year old who wants to leave the club, a young player who is energetic and thus has shone in positions where Rashford and Martial have been disappointing purely because he actually puts in some effort, but ultimately doesn't really look like he has the requisite quality, and Sancho.

The only option I would say we can really rely on during this season is Sancho. Other than that we're hoping for Rashford or Martial to come good, we're hoping Ronaldo still has some goals in him, we're hoping Elanga can do something.

 

[Abraxas]

The manager has already made this point pretty categorically. He's said we don't have enough depth up front for a long, hard season.

He probably also feels we lack some quality, but he wouldn't want to beat down the players he has to work with for a season.

 

[dribirut]

I hate to be the bearer of bad news but slowly and surely after 10 dreadful years, I see many of your standards have fallen. I see many saying "oh it takes time, we need 2-3 seasons" etc. but the reality is we have 6-8 starting players who are simply just not good enough to be in the starting line up. Chelsea, Barcelona, Liverpool, are just 3 examples within the last 5 years that turned their squad around completely in one window. Not having champions is not a good excuse; Look at arsenal this season and they are still looking to bring on more players.

Every team has squad players but this team is ridiculous. Not a single player on this team breaks into the liverpool, chelsea, man city starting line up.

Maguire, Mctominay, vindelof, dalot, elanga, martial, and rashford are simply not good enough to start.

I will give the benefit of the doubt to: Ronaldo, jadon, de gea, malacia, martinez, varane but even some of these are doubtful; and don't even get me started on the bench


Our player purchases this window have been average to bad and that doesnt even take into account we lost matic, pogba, etc.

We need to demand more.

 

[AFC NimbleThumb]

it's not though....we cant win and compete for trophies with just those 4. that's just the simple truth. We won't make it thru the season with just 2 forwards, one out of form striker and one ageing striker

We won’t ‘compete’ for trophies with the midfielders you listed either & a number of them have shown difficulty winning games too.

The simple truth is, we aren’t an attacker or a midfielder away. EtH is going to have limited resources this season & most importantly, we’re 4+ weeks away from the window closing. If you think that midfield can do all you’ve said then I’m more worried about our fanbase than our transfer strategies.

Logically the Best way forward is 352 with our lack of attacking options

Logically we know EtH will play some form of 433/4231/4213 [however you want to frame it] so suggesting a formation change for at best, short term benefit is exactly why we got rid of OgS.

I’m as impatient as any fan but come on, 352 isn’t happening. We have seen how EtH wants to play early in pre-season, we will look good in stretches & our lack of depth will show in others. What we can’t do is start making short term decisions that are inevitable mistakes again.

 

[bosskeano]

@AFC NimbleThumb no i don't think we can win the league or probably finish top 4 with that midfield which is why Frenkie is so important. I was just running a comparison based on the title of the thread to show that we are deeper at midfield than we are in attack. Frenkie would transform our midfield without question b/c of his ability on the ball and ability to carry the ball even in pressure but adding Eriksen has set the group apart from the forwards.

 

[Mr PG]

The manager has already made this point pretty categorically. He's said we don't have enough depth up front for a long, hard season.

He probably also feels we lack some quality, but he wouldn't want to beat down the players he has to work with for a season.

The problem with our forwards when you compare to what he had at Ajax is they all look to shoot first(except Sancho)… all the time. Antony at Ajax always looks to pass first. Antony is a version of Sancho creativity wise

 

[RedIan]

Our board is a laughing stock, its a disgrace, we are one week from a new season and still have mcfred as our cdm, with no replacement for Matic who was better than both these very average players.
a quality cdm and striker urgently needed And Ronaldo moved on.

1 week to go dont gold your breath.……

 

[OrcaFat]

Attack is in need of strengthening but CM is the core of the side and if we don’t sort that we’ll keep getting beat in the big games and we’ll keep getting done on the break by the so called weaker teams.

Ultimately, it is about quality and genuine strengthening. We don’t need “more”players, we need “much better” players and I’d take an elite striker over an average CM. All things equal, CM is the priority for me.

 

[James35]

We need a serious increase in better players for both areas of the pitch. This window so far has been nowhere near good enough and we will certainly struggle this season. I’m predicting it will start on match day one next week.

Let’s hope for some positive news with regards to signings.

 

[OrcaFat]

The problem with our forwards when you compare to what he had at Ajax is they all look to shoot first(except Sancho)… all the time. Antony at Ajax always looks to pass first. Antony is a version of Sancho creativity wise

Top strikers should shoot if possible. One of the worst things about second tier strikers is the refusal to shoot.

The real top guys will shoot if it’s on and only pass if it’s clearly better to do so (which, of course, could be very often in some matches).

 

[Kag]

There is. At least in midfield we have numbers in spite of the obvious lack of quality.

Up front we don’t even have options. Ronaldo, Martial, Rashford and Sancho are the only first team attacking options at the club.

If you didn’t laugh then you’d cry.

 

[AndySmith1990]

CM RW and ST required. Promote Garnacho and Zidane to the first team to make up the numbers, sell Chong and Elanga, bring in a RB too and we'll be okay this season

 

[antohan]

We clearly need a proper striker. Cavani for a while showed us what we had been missing for years playing wide forwards through the middle. It's like that never happened and, two years on, we are back to square one.

 

[Borys]

There is. At least in midfield we have numbers in spite of the obvious lack of quality.

Up front we don’t even have options. Ronaldo, Martial, Rashford and Sancho are the only first team attacking options at the club.

If you didn’t laugh then you’d cry.

In attack we have 4 players for 3 positions. Possibly Bruno can take false 9 so that makes it 4 for two positions. Neither of Ronaldo, Martial, Rashford and Sancho can be easily upgraded.

In midfield we have 3 senior players for 2 positions, possibly 3 for 3 if we are ever going to play midfield 3.
From those 3, 2 can be easily upgraded (McTominay and VdB).

It's a close call but in the end midfield is priority.

 

[Bwuk]

I agree.

Martial & Rashford looked good in pre season, but I think we are kidding ourselves on if we think they’ll score enough goals next year.

 

[flappyjay]

I know this might sound crazy to some given how glaring and lacking our midfield has been but today's game has shown up the fact that we are really lightweight in attack. Things look all dandy in our attacking play the previous pre season games when we had all our forwards fit and available(aside Ronaldo but that's another story) but just 1 missing out(Sancho) and the drop in quality was massive. Suddenly there were no connections between the forwards and things looked a bit chaotic anytime the ball got to our attackers.

The drop of quality between Sancho and Elanga was brutal. Sure it looked nice and dandy when all of Rashford, Martial and Sancho played but we're not expecting them to be available for every game. Martial will get injured(he already did get hurt in this game) as has been the case the past few seasons and Sancho gets ill once in a while. Not to mention they can't play every game. Then we have the Ronaldo issue, whether he'll stick around or not.

While our midfield is weak, we have bodies in there who'll keep the quality a lot better than our attack when any of our main forwards are out. We essentially only have 4 competent attacking players(and this is presuming Ronaldo sticks around) for 3 positions.

Do you still stand by this statement?

 

[RedDevil@84]

Not really. It was obvious more than half our team needed addressing, both midfield and attack. And we refused to do so because, nobody knows for sure. Some blame the Glazers for not giving the money, some blame Murtough and others, some blame scouting and negotiation teams. Whatever be the reason, we refused to do anything about it.

And it shows. And now we are hoping ETH has a magic wand.