It wasn't the best performance, granted. Soton dragged us down to a mediocre level, But lets look at the positives, watkins looked threatening. Ming was commanding. The subs were well timed, and a wins a win. Keep the faith, Steveies interview was far more upbeat than previous interviews, and that'll filter through to the lads.. FACTI wont be suprised if there's not a run coming on!
I thought Watkins worked very hard and took up some promising positions. What I dont get is why we are finding it so hard to improve his first touch, which is horrific. Just dont let him off the training pitch until the groundsman is swinging his keys around and complaining that his tea is going cold.
Quote from: PeterWithe on September 18, 2022, 09:06:45 AMI thought Watkins worked very hard and took up some promising positions. What I dont get is why we are finding it so hard to improve his first touch, which is horrific. Just dont let him off the training pitch until the groundsman is swinging his keys around and complaining that his tea is going cold.I thought his first touch on Friday was improved?
Quote from: PeterWithesShin on September 17, 2022, 03:40:44 PMQuote from: The Edge on September 17, 2022, 03:20:51 PMOk for all those picking apart my comment I say this. Watkins is not a goalscorer. Simple. How many one on one's have we seen him fluff? He had two away at City last season which would of seen us go 3 or 4 nil up against one of the best sides on the planet. I'm aware of inflation so the 40mil Liverpool paid for Salah would be more than that today. But he was still a relatively cheap player inthe scheme of things and if we are serious about challenging at the top end that's precisely what we should be trying to emulate. I can't understand why people are arguing against it. Again, if it's so easy why isn't everyone in the league doing it? Salah joined a side in the Champions League for a fee 5 years ago that is still more than we've ever paid for a player. Those are the reasons i'm saying it's not easy. No one is saying they wouldn't like an upgrade on Watkins, but it's not as easy as you are trying to make out.I never said it was easy. I said it's what we should be aiming to do. My point is Watkins is not a goalscorer. He's an absolute machine with his work rate and gives the opposition nightmares but we need a 20 goals a season striker if we are going to challenge at the top. I suppose I'm guilty of stating the bleeding obvious.
Quote from: The Edge on September 17, 2022, 03:20:51 PMOk for all those picking apart my comment I say this. Watkins is not a goalscorer. Simple. How many one on one's have we seen him fluff? He had two away at City last season which would of seen us go 3 or 4 nil up against one of the best sides on the planet. I'm aware of inflation so the 40mil Liverpool paid for Salah would be more than that today. But he was still a relatively cheap player inthe scheme of things and if we are serious about challenging at the top end that's precisely what we should be trying to emulate. I can't understand why people are arguing against it. Again, if it's so easy why isn't everyone in the league doing it? Salah joined a side in the Champions League for a fee 5 years ago that is still more than we've ever paid for a player. Those are the reasons i'm saying it's not easy. No one is saying they wouldn't like an upgrade on Watkins, but it's not as easy as you are trying to make out.
Ok for all those picking apart my comment I say this. Watkins is not a goalscorer. Simple. How many one on one's have we seen him fluff? He had two away at City last season which would of seen us go 3 or 4 nil up against one of the best sides on the planet. I'm aware of inflation so the 40mil Liverpool paid for Salah would be more than that today. But he was still a relatively cheap player inthe scheme of things and if we are serious about challenging at the top end that's precisely what we should be trying to emulate. I can't understand why people are arguing against it.
Quote from: The Edge on September 17, 2022, 04:02:33 PMQuote from: PeterWithesShin on September 17, 2022, 03:40:44 PMQuote from: The Edge on September 17, 2022, 03:20:51 PMOk for all those picking apart my comment I say this. Watkins is not a goalscorer. Simple. How many one on one's have we seen him fluff? He had two away at City last season which would of seen us go 3 or 4 nil up against one of the best sides on the planet. I'm aware of inflation so the 40mil Liverpool paid for Salah would be more than that today. But he was still a relatively cheap player inthe scheme of things and if we are serious about challenging at the top end that's precisely what we should be trying to emulate. I can't understand why people are arguing against it. Again, if it's so easy why isn't everyone in the league doing it? Salah joined a side in the Champions League for a fee 5 years ago that is still more than we've ever paid for a player. Those are the reasons i'm saying it's not easy. No one is saying they wouldn't like an upgrade on Watkins, but it's not as easy as you are trying to make out.I never said it was easy. I said it's what we should be aiming to do. My point is Watkins is not a goalscorer. He's an absolute machine with his work rate and gives the opposition nightmares but we need a 20 goals a season striker if we are going to challenge at the top. I suppose I'm guilty of stating the bleeding obvious. Unless a player is the very best in their position, then I'm never 100% against trying to improve the side by bringing in better, but sometimes you have to accept other positions are priorities, and that the players who ARE better that what we have, simply aren't gettable (at the minute). I don't think a striker capable of getting (or likely to get close to) 20 goals a season is going to join us, in our current position. We need to be in Europe, and looking to challenge the top four before we can attract that level of talent. We might unearth someone, get lucky with our recruitment, or strike gold with a homegrown player, but to go out and splash the cash to recruit that striker who guarantees goals simply isn't realistic right now. That's not to say I don't think we're trying, I'm just sure we don't get a look in once champions league sides start sniffing around.All that said, Man City won the league last year and their top scorer was a midfielder with 15 (De Bruyne). Sterling was their top scoring forward with 13. If we spread the goals around a bit more we wouldn't NEED a 20 goals a season striker. We just don't create enough full stop. Haaland would be lucky to have three or four by this stage if he was in the middle of our front three.
Where is he now? Get him in, seeing as we couldn't compete with selling the Wolves dream to Diego Costa.
Nope, he's at Oviedo.