Gone Elsewhere Chuba Akpom

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we should have moved heaven and earth to get this guy when ndiaye left
can transition the ball from defence to attack with simple movements and accurate passes as well as finishing off his own work with calm finishes
ah well
 
Kizmet said:
we should have moved heaven and earth to get this guy when ndiaye left
can transition the ball from defence to attack with simple movements and accurate passes as well as finishing off his own work with calm finishes
ah well
Click to expand...
I thought we did, we just weren't happy to double our offer and write off a significant amount of our total budget for him when Ajax massively overly paid for him.
At Ā£5-6M it made sense, Ā£12M was a huge risk for someone who had only been a one season wonder.
 
Funny that most on here didn't want Akpom in summer.

"One season wonder" they say. How many championship strikers do you expect to get for peanuts scoring 28 goals in 38 matches....
 
Silent Blade said:
Only 2 starts tells you that he is like what Andy Gray for us. He scores goals but is a poor team player. No use for us if we arenā€™t creating chances this season
Click to expand...
Him and Archer as a partnership might have gave us a bit of hope as they know eachother. Pointless signing anyone anyway..
 

We should try for Akpom in January, need someone in for next season's championship challenge
 
Silent Blade said:
Only 2 starts tells you that he is like what Andy Gray for us. He scores goals but is a poor team player. No use for us if we arenā€™t creating chances this season
Click to expand...

Akpom played a lot of his football at 10, behind Archer last season. He got a lot of his goals arriving into the box and getting on the end of crosses. Certainly not a tap-in merchant.

I wouldn't bother signing him though if, as is likely, we're cast adrift by January.
 
Ndiayewillalwaysloveyou said:
Funny that most on here didn't want Akpom in summer.

"One season wonder" they say. How many championship strikers do you expect to get for peanuts scoring 28 goals in 38 matches....
Click to expand...

Check his stats......talk to Boro fans, they will tell you he's been generally poor at Boro but had 1 fantastic season.
He's not even young. Think he's 28, so he's spent 9 years being poor/ average and 1 year being really good

Logic would suggest to remain cautious because he'll likely be a risk.
Looks like Ajax were prepared to take the risk and it's not worked, he's probably returned back to being a poor/ average player again.
I'd have Akpom but he's a big risk, so wouldn't pay over the odds for him.

Like with all players, their performances are often based on how they are used. Think Akpom has always been used as a centre forward but last season he was more of an attacking midielder playing the David McGoldrick role, with Archer being more advanced as a true centre forward. Akpom was operating deeper making late runs and linking up with Archer transformed him.

Maybe he would join us, if we made it clear we would play him in the same way he did at Boro last season
and he'll be given the opportunity to link up with his old stable mate, Archer.
 
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Wilder would be able to attract him here. Got him out of the cold from a loan spell and put him into the first team and he went from strength to strength.

It was Warnock who loaned him out!
 
You can buy a new fiddle but if the same guy is playing the tune (Hecky) it wonā€™t sound any better.

Not that changing Hecky is going to work, think the clubs starting to drift into a downward spiral (like me and football) :(
 
We have a "sell to buy" model. Due to his age and lack of pedigree it was never a feasible proposition once the bidding got above a level where the fee/wages were sizeable and a significant profit was increasingly unlikely to be recouped.

The fact we've signed younger players that fit the age profile but are likely to mirror that outcome is another failure of our application of the "sell to buy" model. It's a little bit embarrassing that the two strikers in world football we seem to have seriously looked at are Archer and Akpom. You could have asked any Blade on the Kop to suggest two strikers and they'd have likely been the two . So much for scouting...
 
Iā€™m not sure where folk think we offer any evidence of quality scouting.
Our summer business has been proof of that ā€œscoutingā€ team being none other than very poor.

But when you donā€™t want to invest in infrastructure and instead talk it up and then play lip service to it instead this is what you end up with.

Cheaper players (letā€™s face it none were exactly cheap) who are still way over priced but then also way out of their depth.
The only one or two that may end up useful are the ones that we saw plenty of as opponents last season!

So when all is said and done, a lot was made of Wilder wasting money and his poor recruitment, yet in the 3 years since he left nothing about the recruitment has changed. The successes are the ones weā€™ve had plenty of knowledge and experience of playing against, and the others nowhere near the level or simply donā€™t fit with any kind of playing style we are capable of.

So you have to ask what the common denominator is over the past 4-5 years when the recruitment has fallen away from the earlier successes of the Wilder years.
Even then, Iā€™d argue that Injuries/illness canā€™t really be classed as evidence of failure.
McB- plenty of evidence to suggest he was going to be a success
Brewster- as above, ticked all the boxes we lacked, looked a quality player for Swansea and looked to be going only in an upward trajectory.
Berge- Age, physique, pace, ability and class. Again looked to be heading only one way. (Iā€™d argue we badly utilised him as well as his injury luck)

Fact is, if you want to stay in the premier league, the players that got you there and get older need replacing with quality. We tried, we were unlucky. It failed.
Weā€™ve then gone up and instead of thinking we canā€™t be that unlucky again, weā€™ve opted for a totally opposite policy that is pauper by premier league standards, but rich for the leagues belowā€¦.problem is we havenā€™t brought in players good enough for this league or the championship.
So we are heading for a whole world of pain!!
 
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