Strikers? We need to look closer to home
The failure to bring in a goalscorer in the summer – even with an apparent willingness to pay up to £30 million plus – suggests that we are looking in the wrong places and that the days of getting into tug of wars for over-priced foreigners should be ended.
Michy Batshuayi has hardly torn trees up at Chelsea despite a £40 million price tag and neither Carlos Bacca or Alexandre Lacazette have shown themselves to be anything better than average.
And it’s hardly a scouting system when you simply find the most expensive players in Europe and try to buy them is it?
Here’s my point! With the exception of Dimi Payet, our best signings over the last two or three years have been a couple of Englishmen – Aaron Cresswell and Michail Antonio who cost us £7 million each.
And with a brains trust of recruitment officers such as Slaven, Tony Henry and an army of scouts, surely somewhere in the English leagues decent prospects must be available.
One name becomes more prominent than most when you look into the Championship for example where former Crystal Palace striker Dwight Gayle has managed 11 goals in 13 games since joining Newcastle who bought him for £10 million. Others who are scoring regularly are Cameron Jerome at Norwich (6), Kyle Lafferty (5).
Now I’m not suggesting any of these are the answer to our problems but what I do believe is that we have – over a number of years – been brainwashed into believing that you need to spend a fortune on foreigner. Players such as Michail Antonio and Charlie Austin (eight so far in all competitions) and the youngster – Tammy Abraham (12 in 20 at Bristol City on loan from Chelsea) show that there are players much closer to home who are capable of doing the business.
Let’s hope that our scouts have nailed a real prospect this winter because by God we need one!