Prem "Big 6" lacking the elite strikers of yesteryear?

HangTime

HangTime

HangTime

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So at the game last night I was reminded how useless Jackson is, the only player I've ever seen get a hattrick from a 5/10 performance at best (vs Spurs this season).
Arsenal have a few question marks over whether they have a proper out-and-out striker who will bang in 20+ a season in the league.
Nunez never gives me confidence, you feel like every chance he wants to just smash his laces through it so he'll score the occasional worldie whilst fluffing another handful of chances (his conversion rate of 13% is comfortably the worst of any player with 10+ goals). Appreciating maybe Gakpo, Jota in the mix here but none of them seem to be world beaters at striker.
At MU, Rashford is decent but blows hot and cold plus doesn't seem to play as an out and out striker that often, Martial doesn't look like a £50m player to me, Hojland one for the future perhaps.
At Spurs, fair enough Son can fill that role well but he's not quite at Kane's level.
Finally Man City, no issue there for me (despite the flak Haaland has copped of late).

So for me personally that's only two out of the six where I'm looking at it and going nothing needs to change there. The others, I look at it and go if I could pluck out a top striker and drop them in that club, they'd be improved.

Now, I accept that part of this will be down to changes in formations / tactics, with many teams playing a 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1 or whatever and relying on more goals from the widemen / inverted forwards. Salah, Saka etc end up as top scorer sometimes for their clubs. Palmer this season for Chelsea. I get the fact that we've moved on and are no longer playing four-four-***ing-two, yeah?
But even so, if I think about it just in terms of the main striker, and compare to years gone by, it feels like less teams from the traditional 'big six' have that top striker. Just stop a moment and think about Drogba, Auba, Suarez, Ronaldo, Kane, Aguero etc (plus many others I could mention).
Or to flip it round, if you asked me to pick a striker from the traditional big six clubs, and replace with the best striker from that club when they were in their pomp, there's not many where I'm voting for the new guy.
I don't fully buy the idea that the modern game doesn't need strikers, I think it can accommodate the lack of a good traditional striker a bit better, because you get more output from elsewhere, but I still think a top striker can put that extra icing on the cake.

If you look at the challenger clubs that are muscling their way into top six like Villa and Newcastle, they both have strikers getting in and amongst the goals (Watkins and Isak both in top 5).
 
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probably says a lot about how in modern football its more about the rest of the team rather than having some Ronaldo character always screaming that they should have been passed the ball
 
The game has changed. When the top 6 play, other teams sit 10 men behind the ball, deep. Strikers are then less involved as the midfield players get as high as them anyway. We therefore get less 1 on 1 balls played through to strikers. Less matches are open these days as the competition is so high to get the win. Look at Odegaard for Arsenal, he's often the highest player closing down the defence, and he's traditionally more of a CAM. His fitness level is overlooked actually.

It's now a requirement to have more technical, dynamic players. Odegaard, Silva, Mcallister. And then quick wingers/full backs to do damage on the flanks. Basically I think teams like Arsenal that rely more on a collective to score goals is actually I think a healthy thing. Relying on a big bold horse like Harland is more old school and I'm surprised that fit the "citeh" way last season. It was more akin to Burnley than the finesse of City! It also adds risk relying on a "main man" so to speak, with the fixture stacks and fitness requirements to be injury free for so long.

I think it's a natural thing and don't see it changing much in the prem going forward. It's just the way it has become.
 
As others have said, screamers scored from 10/20 yards outside the box aren't how the game's played anymore and that's bled into how players are trained/recruited. Top teams want smart, quick and tactically diverse forwards who can keep the ball and play to a system.

Going to sound like a backhanded compliment and god knows I adore the lad, but Watkins is the prime example of a middling modern day striker. He rarely ever scores worldies and he's not lightning quick, but he knows where the space is, times his runs to perfection, isn't too greedy and most importantly knows his position.

It speaks volumes for how the games progressed. Most forwards in the league are good, but good isn't enough anymore. Managers want mailable geniuses and they're exceptionally few and far between.
 
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Tactically the game at the elite level doesn't really support what we might describe as the traditional No.9. I blame Pep.
Wingers used to play on the wing and they played on the wing that their strongest foot was because their job was largely to create space behind a full back for cross. Now it seems the vogue to invert the wingers and/or the full backs to drive inside for a shooting opportunity. Personally I don't like it but that might be because I am used to seeing Antony, Sancho, Rashford all be largely ineffective in doing this. These positions are also asked to provide a lot more utility for teams now in terms of their work in pressing the opposition. City do create for Halaand but not always and he looks like an exception in world football.
The other aspect that is completely changed is the physicality required to play CF. They are almost all big units - Toney, Calvert Lwein, Halaand, Kane, Watkins. No more more Keegan, Rush, Owen, Fowler, Phillips. Vardy might be the last of the pee weeps.
Football goes in cycles. I am getting old and liked when John Robertson was swinging them over for Joe Jordan to nod in. Maybe if big Sam gets another top job we will see it pivot again :)
 
I think it just reflects how the game has changed, goals are shared amongst more players now than in the past. Football has definitely become a more technical game and modern players seem to generally reflect this. I find it amazing that City can have a striker as good as Haaland but not really need him (I don't doubt his goal scoring prowess but they seem to cope fine when he's not playing).
 
Regarding changes in the way the game is played, which I do acknowledge, I think that's more of a slower trend over time and even just a couple of years ago we had the likes of Kane, Aubameyang, Ronaldo etc in the premier league (no Haaland but they had Aguero). I'd say until very recently at least two-thirds of the big6 had a good top striker compared to one-third as I badge it today. That's what I sort of came to the realisation on this week, all of a sudden the strikers have fallen away much quicker than formation / playstyle changes occurred.
 
HangTime said:
Regarding changes in the way the game is played, which I do acknowledge, I think that's more of a slower trend over time and even just a couple of years ago we had the likes of Kane, Aubameyang, Ronaldo etc in the premier league (no Haaland but they had Aguero). I'd say until very recently at least two-thirds of the big6 had a good top striker compared to one-third as I badge it today. That's what I sort of came to the realisation on this week, all of a sudden the strikers have fallen away much quicker than formation / playstyle changes occurred.
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And yet we have a record number of goals ever scored in the prem this season already set, with a shedload of games still to play. It's clearly not an issue in that regard. If anything, I think the games are less open than of old, and are even more tightly fought affairs and very defensive at times. The stats seem to counter that assessment! So ultimately perhaps we need to look positively at the prem and just enjoy that it's healthy in the goal department?
 
jaybee said:
And yet we have a record number of goals ever scored in the prem this season already set, with a shedload of games still to play. It's clearly not an issue in that regard. If anything, I think the games are less open than of old, and are even more tightly fought affairs and very defensive at times. The stats seem to counter that assessment! So ultimately perhaps we need to look positively at the prem and just enjoy that it's healthy in the goal department?
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The goals I think are because It's not a game of strikers anymore, it's a game of systems.....the top teams impose their system on tbe opposition who often are just trying to keep a lid on it..... and everything is such fine margins that when there's a mismatch in the two systems at play, there ends up being a lot of openings and goals.

I feel like it's quite rare that you get a proper ding-dong end to end game where it feels like two sets of players pitching their skills against each other, more like a chess match where having the players to execute your strategy and sticking to it is more important than having the best players.

Still entertaining, especially if you're a utd fan, we definitely don't have the players to play our system so every game is an absolute car crash interspersed with brilliance.
 
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