I have to admit, if anybody had told me five years ago when I first saw Alexander Sorloth play for Crystal Palace that he’d become a prolific goal scorer, I’d have laughed.
Not only that, if it had also been suggested that the giant Norwegian striker would be one of the best strikers in La Liga and on the cusp of joining West Ham for £30 million pounds, I’d have suggested a trip to the doctor.
Because the Alexander Sorloth I saw play for Palace looked slow, cumbersome, and anything but prolific. Whilst I’d love to pretend that I’d always suspected the striker would hit the big time, it would be an outright lie.
The Sorloth I saw toil for the Eagles had the turning circle of an oil tanker and none of the qualities required to make it at the top level.
Yet here we are, five years later, and the Norwegian striker is banging in goals for fun and having his dribbling technique clipped and shared on YouTube for all to see. Sorloth has had more clubs than Tiger Woods but somehow managed to find a purple patch in the autumn of his career.
Last season’s exploits with Spanish club Villarreal were exceptional, and the player looked unrecognisable from the one I’d seen five years previously. Whether he’s worth £30m, I honestly couldn’t say, but if new Hammers head coach Julen Lopetegui believes him to be the missing piece of the jigsaw, then it could be interesting, and I’d have to back the signing.
At the very least, he’d be an absolute menace in both penalty boxes.
I’m agreement with Mark the Palace fan, what happened to Sorloth with Hodgson is no difference to clueless Moyes with Haller and later with Scamacca. What I’ve seen of Sorloth last season alone, he’s now top drawer and I definitely wouldn’t say no him being signed. Make it happen Tim.
Weather he is the main man or somebody else is I’m not sure and obviously isn’t for me to decide. I totally understand your state of disbelief, but it was good to hear the palace fan say his piece because imagine a few years down the line and another English club are looking to purchase Haller or Scamacca and one of their supporters say forgot them they are rubbish I saw them play for West Ham back in the day. Whilst they weren’t perfect and their attitude could have been better, but that was probably due to frustration in being coached and told how to play by David Moyes. But I think many of us saw that they both had some great ability that just wasn’t visible the way we set up.
Big No from me. One decent season doesn’t make him a good buy. Approaching 29. No resale value. Makes no sense to sign him. We need to get this signing right as the striker that comes in should be our first choice. We’ve been without a proven striker too long, or have played the decent ones bought in a system that didn’t suit them. There’s a much better striker available, who played in Spain under Lopetegui and is almost half the price of Sorloth.
Moring Ian, having had a closer look it appears that he’s had two prolific seasons so far and they were separated by some average campaigns.
Is this going to happen? with Nesri available for £17million a striker the manager likes and knows well and can do all the things that he is after in a front man i fail to see the sense in making this deal happen both financially and playing wise.
I agree with you I would sooner see En-Nesyri someone he’s worked with before.
Looks like a big gamble to me. Can we afford to make it ? If we have the money available, I would say , go for someone more established & with a reliable record. But, the new manager knows more about football than I do; or, should do !
We need Jonathan David from Lille or victor boniface from Leipzig. We can’t take a punt on a centre forward. We need to just pay the money needed to get the right player! COYI
Huge mistake, in all ways. This will be another colossal waste of money. Useless at Leipzig that you lot call a farmer’s league. Easier to score in Spain than anywhere. 100% not suitable for West Ham or the EPL. Would rather have Ings.
How this is a joke.
I’m a lifelong Palace fan, and it’s no surprise to me. Firstly he got 4 starts at palace …4… Secondly he was playing for Roy Hodgson, and thirdly, Hodgson destroyed every striker he ever had, I mean, that man played Ayew as a striker…!!!! I was one of a few supporters that could see that Sorloth was a good player.. He was profilific before Roy and after Roy, the same thing happened to Mateta, called Bambi and first deivision rubbish under Roy, yet here we are looking at a happy highly prolific striker…. Too many Palace fans failed to see the real issue as Palace, believing that Roy kept us up… No, he kept us below our potential and above the bottom 3.. a below average manager at best.
Cheers for popping on and letting us know Mark