Viktor Gyökeres - Arsenal Player

He was at Coventry 2 & a half years ago putting up average numbers. No one peaks that hard at 25. You’d think that would’ve come up in their due diligence…I guess the relative weakness of the Champions League outside of the PL hoodwinked some folks
 
Funny enough he's who I'd be playing up top if I was Arteta. I've always thought he was better suited through the middle instead of holding extreme width out wide and trying to create.
He was tested up top a few times before. It wasn't pretty, he lacks the striker awareness back to the goal and he's also not strong enough to battle 90mn with defenders.
With 6 months of data, in a summer where many were looking for a striker, the only good one was Ekitike. Everyone else overpaid for their pick.
I think we will still try to ship Jesus out this summer, get somebody else and cut our losses with Gyokeres next year.
 
He was at Coventry 2 & a half years ago putting up average numbers. No one peaks that hard at 25. You’d think that would’ve come up in their due diligence…I guess the relative weakness of the Champions League outside of the PL hoodwinked some folks
Tbf he scored twice against City.

Little did they know it was just City being shit. Or maybe Sporting strikers have some occasional black magic in the CL, their new striker from Liga Segunda scored twice against PSG after all.
 
We talking about the same lukaku? Lukaku is streets ahead of this guy. Think people forget he was prolific in the premier league for about 3 different teams. Strange comparison
“Streets ahead” in terms of being much quicker and more powerful, in exactly the same cul de sac when it comes to having abysmal technique.
 
Tbf he scored twice against City.

Little did they know it was just City being shit. Or maybe Sporting strikers have some occasional black magic in the CL, their new striker from Liga Segunda scored twice against PSG after all.
Are you talking about the 4-1, just before Amorim moved to Utd? If so, Gyokeres had a good game, it was 3 goals, 2 of which were pens. With hindsight, it seems it was more of an outlier than an indication of his actual talent.
 
Premier League record, scoring 121 goals and providing 35-37 assists in 278 appearances. Spanning spells at Chelsea, West Bromwich Albion, Everton, and Manchester United, he is among the top goalscorers in the competition's history. His best season was 2016-17 with 25 goals.
“Streets ahead” in terms of being much quicker and more powerful, in exactly the same cul de sac when it comes to having abysmal technique.
Ya you’re right Gyokeres is better
 
Tbf he scored twice against City.

Little did they know it was just City being shit. Or maybe Sporting strikers have some occasional black magic in the CL, their new striker from Liga Segunda scored twice against PSG after all.
Are you talking about the 4-1, just before Amorim moved to Utd? If so, Gyokeres had a good game, it was 3 goals, 2 of which were pens. With hindsight, it seems it was more of an outlier than an indication of his actual talent.

It might’ve just been a great game boosted by confidence. Average players score against good teams all the time. But to have gone from a so so record in the Championship to immediately being a beast in Portugal clearly pointed to either being an extraordinarily efficient system player, or dropping to a less quality league. The idea that he suddenly became World Class over night after leaving Coventry at 25 was surely a distant 3rd in possibilities? And it’s weird that Arsenal didn’t (seem to) seriously consider this. Especially as they apparently turned down the much younger Sesko in favour of him..
 
I think Sporting Lisbon replaced Gyokeres with a striker from the 2nd tier in Spain and he's smashing it and has like 25 goals already this season.

I think it's increasingly clear the Portugese league is really quite shite.
 
He´s their top scorer.

That´s the thing that you need to take into account before writing him off.

It may just be five measly goals but that´s more than anyone else in a team that´s sitting pretty at the top of the EPL.

Eventually Arsenal fans will get sick of Allarteta´s style of play and demand something that is structured around creating chances from open play.

Ultimately they just don´t create many chances for him.
 
Last edited:
He´s their top scorer.

That´s the thing that you need to take into account before writing him off.

It may just be five measly goals but that´s more than anyone else in a team that´s sitting pretty at the top of the EPL.

Eventually Arsenal fans will get sick of Allarteta´s style of play and demand something that is structured around creating chances from open play.

Ultimately they just don´t create many chances for him.
The team can score goals though. As seen in the champions league.

I think Arteta in the league prefers to be more conservative and they are top with a 4 point gap so it's working.
 
The team can score goals though. As seen in the champions league.

I think Arteta in the league prefers to be more conservative and they are top with a 4 point gap so it's working.

Or, the more probable reason teams are more open in the Champions League and tend to not defend as deep, like Anthony Gordon also said today?
 
He had a slapstick night really, played well, took his goal well, had another off the line and ballooned one over from 3 yards. Overall though the link up with Havertz was very promising, as was our style of play in the first half as a whole.
It all ground to a halt as soon as Odegaard came on, which is a concern.
 
I think he's crap but he's still scored 11 in 31 games. It's not a horrible record - and I think he will get a bit better with Jesus and Havertz to share minutes with.
 
I think he's crap but he's still scored 11 in 31 games. It's not a horrible record - and I think he will get a bit better with Jesus and Havertz to share minutes with.
He got 6 league goals after 24 games and 50% of them came against Leeds, who you beat with an aggregate score of 9-0.

He might improve a tiny bit given enough time but at the moment there’s no getting around the fact that he’s a busted flush, for the £50m odd you spent.
 
He got 6 league goals after 24 games and 50% of them came against Leeds, who you beat with an aggregate score of 9-0.

He might improve a tiny bit given enough time but at the moment there’s no getting around the fact that he’s a busted flush, for the £50m odd you spent.
4 from open play as well.

The whole narrative of Arsenal "needing a 9" was always to turn the draws into wins or be decisive. In the games they've dropped points in in the league this season he's been nowhere.

His only openers or winners have been Burnley away goal line header, pen away at Everton and the early goal v a team I honestly can't name in the CL a couple of weeks ago?

He's a monumental flop for a 27 year old slotting into the best team in the league and one of the top 4 teams in Europe. This would be tempered by good hold up play or good chance creation which he doesn't offer either.
 
Porto, Sporting and Benfica have two losses all season combined in the league (Benfica currently unbeaten).

It's such a shite league outside the top 3. No surprise he scored so many goals there
 
Strikers aren't going to be judged on who they score against, they'll be mostly judged on goals. You wouldn't go digging through Haaland's and disregarding the ones against crap teams. 11 in 31 is simply not bad. I don't even rate him, just pointing out it's not looking disastrous at the moment.

"Monumental flop" is just way over the top. If that's what Gyokeres then what on earth is someone like Isak? Half fit, played crap, scored a goal and broke his leg. £120m.
 
Strikers aren't going to be judged on who they score against, they'll be mostly judged on goals. You wouldn't go digging through Haaland's and disregarding the ones against crap teams. 11 in 31 is simply not bad. I don't even rate him, just pointing out it's not looking disastrous at the moment.

"Monumental flop" is just way over the top. If that's what Gyokeres then what on earth is someone like Isak? Half fit, played crap, scored a goal and broke his leg. £120m.
Yes and No. Lukaku used to get slaughtered for his record against City, Arsenal, Liverpool and Chelsea when he played for us - and many felt his detractors had a point.

Isaks injury was sort of timely in locking him away as a flop, he was starting to come onto a game. He’s a flop thus far for different reasons.
 
Last edited:
Strikers aren't going to be judged on who they score against, they'll be mostly judged on goals. You wouldn't go digging through Haaland's and disregarding the ones against crap teams. 11 in 31 is simply not bad. I don't even rate him, just pointing out it's not looking disastrous at the moment.

"Monumental flop" is just way over the top. If that's what Gyokeres then what on earth is someone like Isak? Half fit, played crap, scored a goal and broke his leg. £120m.
So bad calling him a flop is kindness.

11 in 31 is bad with or without context for a supposed top level striker for a top level team. Everyone for a year or so was highlighting Arsenal needing a striker capable of getting good numbers in terms of goals and you signed a striker who in the past couple of years has been banging them in for Sporting. I know the narrative has shifted now as to why he was bought but it seems fairly obvious to me that he was bought for his goals.

11 in 31 is bad for a striker that was where he was before at Sporting and for a team that's a favourite to win the PL and CL.
 
Last edited:
Heh, you would think we're playing with ten men every game. The rest of the lads must be bloody amazing if he's this bad.
 
This just reminds me of when a bunch of Utd fans were finding excuses for Wout Weghorst in 22/23, because the team were winning.

If Gyokeres costed £15m and has been a rotation player with 11 in 31, you can make a case for him ‘not being that bad’. He costed £50m and are on course to match Højlund’s 23/24 output, as a striker in his prime playing for the league leaders. I doubt Arsenal fans were kind enough to consider Højlund not a flop.
 
Porto, Sporting and Benfica have two losses all season combined in the league (Benfica currently unbeaten).

It's such a shite league outside the top 3. No surprise he scored so many goals there

I just look at Luis Suarez (not that one) who last season was playing for Almeria in the Spanish second division.

He has 18 league goals in 20 games for Sporting so far this season.
 
Heh, you would think we're playing with ten men every game. The rest of the lads must be bloody amazing if he's this bad.
Yeah, the rest of the lads are pretty good. Particularly the defense, which is the best in the league by some distance. Couple that with a great ability to score from set pieces and that might just be enough to win the PL in a weak year.
 
In isolation, he's been poor, it's hard to deny. I'm basically squaring it off by saying he's part of a collective of forwards with different profiles, Havertz, Jesus and Gyok.

Looking at the market for the summer, I'm still struggling to see a number 9 that would be the unicorn number 9 we all want. I'd still think of the forwards as a collective, but maybe look to move Jesus on who would only have a year left on his contract and replace him with a young forward with a similar profile to him, someone like Kroupi would be interesting.
 
Strikers aren't going to be judged on who they score against, they'll be mostly judged on goals. You wouldn't go digging through Haaland's and disregarding the ones against crap teams.

This is exactly what people do tbf. Lukaku being an obvious recent example of a player with a very healthy goal return, whom everyone regularly (and quite reasonably) noted had a terrible record against the top teams.

And Gyokeres is nowhere near Lukaku’s output at present.
 
Lukaku has scored goals everywhere he's been, so if Gyokeres can get close to him then I'd be happy with the signing even if he's stinking out the eye test. Tbh my priority is that we win trophies, not win the transfer market. So if he knocks in 15 against the worst teams and we win a major honour then no one is going to be complaining.
 
Lukaku has scored goals everywhere he's been, so if Gyokeres can get close to him then I'd be happy with the signing even if he's stinking out the eye test. Tbh my priority is that we win trophies, not win the transfer market. So if he knocks in 15 against the worst teams and we win a major honour then no one is going to be complaining.
Not sure a Chelsea fan would agree. £100m for 8 goals.