Martinez in for St Etienne striker

I think it's because if we did sign all these we would have a real good side but I just don't believe we will!!!!!! Objectively I suppose with TV money this outlay is peanuts but surely this is all a load of bollocks with our board?

Keep him the width of the 18-yard box, no wider, and he will get back to scoring. You don't lose that instinctive, one-touch finishing ability if you are played in the correct way.

Don't get me wrong, I'd love it if Martinez suddenly turned Jelly into a 15 goals a season fella, but I find this just as unlikely. Yes, I'm sure Martinez will a play a different system to Moyes's, but how many times last season where you screaming at Jelly to shoot only for him to fluff his lines and fall over the ball?

Only time will tell on both I guess.

I suspect that, with footballers playing at this level, they don't think about what they need to do; much of it is instinct. Moyes is well known for over-coaching players and sending them out with vast sets of instructions (Arteta admitted as much). When you start trying to change the natural behaviour of players at their peak, I can imagine it would fuck up their performances.

Aubameyang looks some player, but I can't see us being able to financially compete with some of the other clubs in for him. £15M is expensive for us, but would still be good value if we could get him at that price.

Personally I think a more likely route is to be picking up players around the £5M mark. Huddlestone is apparently available at that kind of price according to the rags, and I think he'd be a quality, cheaper replacement should Fellaini jump ship, giving us some decent cash to invest elsewhere.

I hope I'm proved wrong but I think if we get this lad he could be an absolutely tremendous signing. Probably all rag rubbish though.

As for Huddlestone, I see him much more as a Gibson type player than a Fellaini replacement. Has Capoue left Toulouse? He looks quality to me.

As for this "Moyes ruining strikers" bullshit, there are no luxury forwards at the top end of the Prem, they all have to work hard and close defenders down when not in possession.

I suppose Moyes also coached him to fluff chances from 6 yards out as well.

Jelavic totally lost form and confidence — that's all there is to it.

United fans won't be blaming the board, the weather or the price of fish.

Quite happy to see how Jela gets on with a forward rather than defensive coach.

I don't believe for one second this lad is valued at £15M. He's really good, don't get me wrong, but he's only really come to the fore in the past 2 years at St Etienne.

He didn't make the grade at AC Milan and had to go to France to show his quality, and he as got bundles of it, but I think you'll be looking at more like £10M for Aubameyang IMO.

The thing is, deals like these (Aubameyang's & Fer's) will only happen when or if we sell the likes of Baines & Fellaini, I believe. I cant see us having a £15M transfer kitty – and we definitely wouldn't blow all or most of it on one player!

Let's just for one second imagine Moyes's intention wasn't to sabotage strikers, and go back to facts. Last year, the current team (assuming we hang onto most of them) played largely attacking football and created a great many chances (I think we were in the top 4 chance creators over the season and were actually number 1 for the first half, up to the end of December).

Our defensive record was the 4th best in the league with just 40 conceded, we'd have been 3rd if we'd avoided defeat or won at Chelsea. However, our goals scored was only 7th best, 11 short of Spurs and City, 16 short of Liverpool and only 2 better than West Brom.

In summary then, tight defence, attacking football, lots of chances but not a lot of goals scored. The obvious conclusion is that our forward line needs improving.

Look at the attacking players and the case seems even clearer – our top league scorer was Fellaini (played advanced but still mainly as a midfielder) with 11, with Mirallas, Baines, Pienaar and Osman all contributing a respectable 5 or 6 goals to the cause alongside an equally fair number of assists each (6 or 7 in most cases, 4 with Osman).

Look at our registered forwards, however, and the output is far less impressive. Lead man Jelavic notched just 7 goals in the league, just one more than understudy Anichebe with 6, and habitual sub Naismith weighed in with 4.

Now ideally you'd be looking for 14-20 goals from a lead striker (12 players from 11 teams achieved this elsewhere last season); in our case, our entire 4-man forward roster (Jelly, Vic, Vellios and Naismith) chipped in just 17 between them, compared to 29 from midfield and 8 from defence.

Granted the strikers didn't play as much gametime (with 58 starts and 41 subs), a fair bit of time was played with one up front, and Naismith was often subbed in out-wide. However, the point remains, if we'd had even one 14+ goal striker (i.e. Jelly pitching in just another 7 goals) and in doing so changed 4 or 5 of our 15 draws into wins, we could be having a laugh in the Champions League now.

All of which is I guess a very long-winded way of saying...'It's about the forwards stupid'. Doubly so, if we let Fellaini go.

Moyes has gone, he now has money to burn and a huge grin on his face due to his £140k a week. He will be tapping up Baines and Fellaini, maybe Barkley and Osman. It's going to be interesting to see how the Ginger One shapes the Man Utd team and how he manages all those huge egos.

I for one am happy he has gone and can only look forward to Roberto bringing back joyous football to Everton. After 11 years of dull, uninspiring, one-dimensional ultra-defensive stuff, we can now open a new page of the Everton Football Club saga.

In fact, with Neville gone too, who the heck is going to break up play. It's not Osman that's for sure.

And Jelavic was not ruined under Moyes... he was missing chances, and miscontrolling, when he should have been doing better. He was never as good as we saw in the six-month period after joining... and not as bad as he played last season. He is a 12-14 league goal a season kind of player... and I expect that's what we will see from him, if he is a regular, over the course of his Everton career.

Personally, I'd prefer more of a quicker physical presence as a lone strike, though.

For all those calling Moyes a defensive coach... we scored the seventh highest amount of goals in the Premier Leagye last season, without a consistently scoring striker. It might be worth bearing that in mind when making comments about Jelavic improving under an attacking coach.

It seems you may be in a minority thinking that he was operating in the same areas, so I'd be interested to see any stats you have to back up your position. From what I recall, he spent a lot of time out of the 18-yard area, and didn't get a vast amount of support or service.

I will agree that Jelavic all round game was poor. His hold-up play and strength for someone who is 6ft+ is laughable, falling over at every opportunity. Maybe this is something that can be coached out of him but, if we are to compete near the top of the league, we probably do need someone with more strength and pace.

Watching Anichebe in Europe a few seasons ago, I did wonder if he could be that player. He has the raw physical ingredients to be a top centre-forward. With a new coach in charge with a completely different mentality to the last one, perhaps we might see some very average players like Anichebe step up their game and reach their potential. To be fair some of his performances in the league last season were more than I thought he was capable of, as he seems to be finally maturing mentally.

Unless I'm thinking of the wrong match, you've picked a horrific example there mate.

Either we can keep to the Moyes's method of playing tall powerful midfielders in attack, playing long balls up to them and bypassing the centre. Or we can play attackers in attack and play through the midfield, using pace and guile to break through rather than physical power and percentage football.

Personally, if we're going with one striker, I see Barkley as the long-term successor to play in the hole. Mirallas would also be a good choice. If you've seen any of the U20 games, Barkley does a sterling job there and it suits his style of play and his abilities, as well as meaning we're unlikely to suffer from his occasional poor choice of ball losing us possession in dangerous areas.

What I'd like to see in the centre are two solid midfield players. For years we've had to make do with flawed players like Osman, Neville, Cahill and Heitinga and it has hurt the team because we were always carrying someone.

A midfield two of Gibson and Huddlestone or Gibson and Fellaini would be solid. They are all complete midfield players who have all the attributes to play there and would dominate most teams, allowing the quicker, more creative forwards to do their jobs.

Huddlestone is limited... he can spray a pass around, but he is not incisive. He is not a good defensive player either, nor a goal scorer... and has a very poor injury record. In the last three seasons he has made a combined 30 Premier League appearances... and I have no idea why we are even discussing him as a potential buy.

If we are not only going to buy a traditional tackling DM, I'd prefer a box-to-box midfielder who can do both... a role Fellaini could occupy, or Leroy Fer.

Jelavic tries his heart out and definitely suffered a huge lack of confidence but is he the answer? That I'm not too sure about. His terrific anticipation takes him to the right places but his oh so ponderous leg speed lets him down.

For me, other priorities are a midfield tiger and a keeper to challenge Howard.

I definitely don't want teenagers. We've more than enough already.

We totally dominated that game, absolutely battered them second half and could have easily scored 5 or 6 if our finishing had been up to snuff.

We were so dominant the Fulham fan sat next to me actually said 'how the hell did we get anything out of that' at the final whistle and thought we'd been the best attacking team he'd seen at Craven Cottage for years.

From SSN:
Vitesse have issued a statement, saying that no agreement is in place with any club - including Swansea.

"Various media have reported that Wilfried Bony is to transfer to Premier League club Swansea City. This message is incorrect," said the statement.

"There is admittedly much interest in the striker, the top scorer in the Eredivisie last season, and Swansea City are one of the interested clubs. However, a transfer is not the case."

Doesn't sound like a done deal to me. Also the comments on Sky stress that a number of players have looked awesome in Holland and failed to replicate that in tougher leagues.

To be honest, mate, stats do my head in. I prefer to watch the game and make my own mind up.

Sorry to hurt your feelings as it seems you keep going on about Moyes, but he is a tactically inept, dithering, deceitful turncoat.

And to think he was virtually worshiped by the Moyesists for being loyal and dignified, yet he seems quite happy to collect a month's wages for no work and bid for a player he still officially works with until Monday.

God, we gave him a rousing reception after West Ham that made him look like Ferguson now look at him, he has treated us like dirt at the end of his shoe by accepting a month's pay for nothing and trying to sign our best player when he said that he wouldn't.

So much for wishing the club well. Good riddence to the man.

I'm not angry with him leaving, I'm angry with the way he has treated us, that's all.

As for the last month and Baines, it's holiday time so all footballers are being paid to do nothing and Man Utd would have bid for Baines whoever was manager. All I see is a lot of misplaced anger.

As for the rights and wrongs of him bidding for Baines, ask Mr Kenwright what he thinks, I bet you he is more upset than we are as he trusts DM implicitly.

In the first half of the season, we were doing pretty well, but I'd go on record as saying in the second half of the season we were lucky to get more than three or four actual decent chances per game. Baines's assists dried up as his corners and crosses turned to shite; Pienaar was a disgrace for 90% of the last half, and Coleman only managed to get a handful of crosses in anyway.

It's all well and good to say the strikers had chances but, for the most part, they were extremely desperate situations – situations that happen a whole lot faster at ground level than they look from the stands or from a screen. I saw a lot of the chances Jelavic missed, and could put a lot of them down to the delivery being the wrong side of average, as well as him being knackered for most of the season, trying to get onto a ball in the space of half a second.

I'm not absolving him of all blame; he should have scored more... but it wasn't all down to him. I'll put money on Jelavic scoring five more this season and RVP scoring five less.

"31% of Nikica Jelavic’s shots came from clear cut chances during the 2012-13 season, which was a higher percentage than any of the other players in this comparison. 30% of Papiss Cisse’s shots came from clear cut chances, 27% of Victor Anichebe’s shots and 26% of Hugo Rodallega’s shots came from clear cut chances."

http://www.eplindex.com/33893/worst-strikers-front-goal-1213-stats-analysis.html

The major downside to him is his recent history of injuries. I think he was out for a year or so with ankle problems, but that looks to be behind him. He's been available for most of the second half of this season, but has struggled behind Parker and Dembele as far as I know.

I don't agree that a midfield with Gibson and Huddlestone would be leaky. They would certainly be a better combo than Gibson + Osman, Heitinga, Neville or Barkley. I'm not sure where else you get someone with his proven Premier League ability for £5M. I can see him becoming an England regular too if he gets some game time. It's difficult to judge players when they only get a few games here and there.

If we can pick up Fer for £8M and if he hasn't got any injury issues, he may be a better bet, but I can't say I've ever seen him play. Huddlestone is certainly worth a punt at £5M in my book, though because he's significantly better than what we have and still in the right age range.

To the people who claim Moyes doesn't ruin strikers, name me one player who came to Everton and has a better scoring record after joining?

Andy Johnson: 74 goals in 140 games for Palace; 17 in 61 for Everton
James Beattie: 68 in 204 for Southampton 13 in 76 at Everton
Yakubu: 29 in 65 at Portsmouth, 25 in 73 at Middlesbrough, 25 in 82 at Everton then 17 in 30 at Blackburn

Yakubu came the closest to recreating good form, was sold for less than £2m, and went on to have brilliant season.

If we are going to invest £5 million, I'd much prefer it directed towards Honda, who is only 6 months older or a younger model. I don't think it's relevant to look at Huddlestone as a better combo than Heitinga, Osman, Barkley or Neville. Barkley is an AMC, and doesn't have the skills for CM... and he didn't play there for us. Neville is no longer at the club, and Heitinga very rarely played CM, and if he is at the club, won't play there next season. Osman is a better, more mobile player than Huddlestone.

But I think it's all irrelevant anyway... Huddlestone is not Martinez's type of player, and we are never in a million years going to pay £5 million for him. Let Sunderland waste their money instead.

Complete and utter bollocks skewing the complete picture only your eyes and own knowledge can give.

The only stat worth a bean is which team won – all the other stuff is there to be manipulated – they mean absolutely fuck all in isolation.

We always knew Moyes would try to pry players away once he moved, despite what he apparently said... after all, he works for Manure now — and I am sure he may get what he wants as "money talks".

My favourite post has to be that of Rathbone, if only for it's utter lunacy and total lack of logic: "Usage of football stats is inversely proportional to the users knowledge of football."

That's clearly nonsense isn't it. That'd mean that Opta, the newspapers, the presenters and analysts and oh just about everybody who covers football would have no idea what they are talking about.

It'd also make the majority of the Premier League managers and coaches seem rather clueless for their use of systems like Prozone and other monitoring tactics. From what I understand, Mourinho assembles vast dossiers of information on players and teams through data and scouts – what an idiot!

The point you seem to be making is that actual factual data isn't as valuable for building an argument upon as the subjective opinion of one individual. Do you really believe that?

"Complete and utter bollocks skewing the complete picture only your eyes and own knowledge can give." – So you believe everything you see then Barry? You've probably learned everything you know about world history from Hollywood movies. Although I'd imagine you don't waste too much time at the cinema, as you can only every grow your vast mass of knowledge based on experiences you've witnessed first hand, you must be constantly out and about doing things and travelling the world.

As you frequently spout opinion on Everton Football Club and their motives, I imagine you'll have spent a fair bit of time working on the inside of the club, at board meetings, negotiating transfers and the training pitch too. Otherwise you'd be forced to form opinions on second-hand reporting or data-based facts.

"The only stat worth a bean is which team won – all the other stuff is there to be manipulated – they mean absolutely fuck all in isolation." Well that's not totally unreasonable I suppose.

You could consider that there are multiple factors which play into the ultimate outcome of a match, some of them highly random (poor refereeing decisions), others more predictable (quality of opposition, quality of players in particular positions as an end result of budgets).

I would also add that my argument wasn't based on stats 'in isolation' but rather a combination of a series of data-based factors. Oh, and if it adds further weight to your case, I've also seen virtually every match Everton played this year, either in person or on a TV screen (although presumably the latter is somehow less valid, offering as it does a slightly removed overview of the entire pitch complete with replays and analysis as opposed to the single one-time point of view from one spot in the stands – I'm assuming behind one of the goals).

I'm sick of reading about Jelavic, Gibson, Osman, Fellaini and Baines.

Come back Mr Martinez. Give us something new.

For starters, data (which is what a stat is) tells you nothing. It needs to be analysed, interpreted and converted into useful information. Even then, it should be taken with a significant measure of scepticism.

For example, Phil Neville was allegedly one of the best passers in the team. His pass completion ratio was one of the highest, if not the highest.

Anyone who actually watches the games will tell you something else. The problem is that the pass completion ratio doesn't tell you what kind of passes they were. Forwards, backwards, long, short, hospital for example.

Most other stats are similarly flawed. If you use "distance covered" as a metric to measure a players' worth, it tells you nothing about whether any of that running was worthwhile.

When you watch a game you're taking in a hell of a lot more useful information than any stat can ever provide. You can use stats as an additional measure, but never on their own, in my opinion.

I think we see far too much bad use of stats - I'm sure I've done it myself in the past. People have an opinion, then drag out all the "factual" evidence to support their arguments(which is fine), but purposefully ignore anything that doesn't quite fit with their view of things(which isn't a good thing).

There aren't many objective people unfortunately, and many don't even make an attempt to be. Because of this I've grown to distrust the opinion of people when they start spouting numbers, unless their case contains something more tangible that I can relate to.

From watching games all season Jelavic seemed to have had plenty of opportunities in central positions that were continually fluffed, rarely called for the ball and generally loks half the player we bought.
Anichebe was much improved and at times worked hard and looked threatening but at others had touch found lacking and though certainly meriting a place on the bench or a support striker in 4-4-2 still doesn't feel like a top class striker to lead the line.
Elsewhere, Naismith seems to know where the net is, but feels to me like a championship player in terms of all round game, whilst Vellios despite looking dangerous in patches doesn't seem to have the right attitude and McAlney should be given a run out but it's far too early to rely on him.

Add all these insights together and my gut feeling is that we need to buy some genuine quality up front to back up what I perceive to be a talented and comparatively creative midfield (which in my view played some lovely attacking football for much of the season.

Everyone happy?

Good luck with that.

Still think Jelly offers something, hopefully Bobby can work some magic on him.

I was going to rip into the drivel posted in response to my "stats in isolation" post but if people want to waste time essaying about a post they don't understand that's their problem.

You nailed it.

Has anyone seen the Norwich striker Luciano Becchio? He doesn't seem to have settled in to Norwich. I saw him in quite a few games for Leeds United and he was deadly close in or far out from goal. A good goal tally in his 5 seasons at Leeds United. He's 29 and Argentine.

I think he would play well under Roberto. Worth enquiry I would say. And would well be within our reach, wallet-wise, I would think.

Comedy gold sir.

THE BAD NEWS
At the medical, scans revealed the striker has a twisted sock so all bets are off.

PREDICTION:
The beauts piss us all off AGAIN with Everton's transfer season...

Surely this is wrong.

ps: You may have noticed that Wayne's position was better argued and considerably more balanced than yours. No surprise there.

My opinion of watching us over the course of the season was that, when we committed numbers forward into the danger areas, we gave the striker decent chances, because there were options and something more for the defenders to watch. Our biggest failing was that too often we had 1 or 2 guys in the penalty area facing 5 or 6 opposition players. Our striker was on a hiding to nothing with those kind of odds.

I certainly think we lack real quality in attack, compared to about half the league, but I also suspect that assuming Martinez has a more attacking philosophy than Moyes, we'll see Jelavic back to his free-scoring form we witnessed during his first 6 months at the club.

For Moyes's methods to work with a striker, we need a Drogba-type player who is big enough to bully defenders, and mobile and technically good enough to do something on his own when he's 30 yards from the nearest blue shirt and 40 yards from goal.

I think and hope Martinez will bring out the best in the majority of our players, but especially the forwards. It would still be nice to be able to go out and get a Lukaku, but I think a change of philosophy will be as good as a change of player.

What needs to be added is a mystery.

Are you addicted to inane waffle about points already dealt with or are you a bit dehydrated?

Very odd request.

Look at the posts.

Wayne says that he himself prefers to use his own judgement on what he has seen rather than looking at stats. Fair enough.

You however say 'Usage of football stats is inversely proportional to the user's knowledge of football.' which is clearly totally subjective bollocks.

Wayne himself is only able to say that he sort of agrees with your sentiment.

Even if you are singing from the same hymn sheet, wayne is at least singing partially in tune, you however are not.

But, for those who want to join, a new MOB will be started on the 1st July; all those who wish to register should contact... well, nobody, it is up to you as an individual to choose. The other group formerly knows as IMWT can also feel free to join the new group.

A new era awaits but the old arguments will never die.

Come on you Blues. Viva el Sr Martínez, Viva la evolución.

There's a reason Becchio hasn't settled at Norwich and that is because he isn't good enough at PL level. I've seen him play along side Beckford in League 1 for Leeds Utd and he looked okay at that level, but he wasn't as prolific as Beckford. I'm not a big fan of Big Vic or Jelavic, but I would much rather see them two in our starting 11, rather than Becchio.

Although we can't afford a top proven striker from one of the top leagues, we should be looking at players like Bony, Van Vossen and this lad from St Etienne; anything over £11 million though, is too much to be spending on one striker

We will sign a couple of frees in the last week of August with Felly going on the last day, too late for us to do anything.

Has us looking for strikers that can do a job for us, we do look at them but that's all we do – look at them.

As for Vic, I'd let him go tomorrow. But Jelly, I think there's more to come from him. We've seen a glimpse of what he can do and that doesn't go away overnight.

Jelly had one problem, it was called Moyes.

Back on planet earth Wayne just put more meat on the bone and patted your fuming little head - the message was the same - what do you want a cut and paste of Wayne's answer?

Retire with dignity, you took a partial point of my original post and ignored the qualifying statement then got nailed.

It's opinion you buffoon, now stop with the pompous garbage and check your french spelling.

Adam Le Fondre (Reading) 12 goals last season and he's restless. Could get him for next nothing and I'm not talking as main striker but as back up. Have you seen him Mark? Proved he can score in top flight.

Is it right that for Rooney to move from Man U, he can only go to a bigger club? Something to do with the sponsor's? Any idea?

That will be his dream....but what will Nike say.

Surely he sells more Nike kits and boots whilst at man u than he would anywhere else. And for that reason his agent, Nike, and Moyes will alk him in staying.

We should unsettle Rooney by getting ex evertonians to make comments on "how he should go abroad before the World Cup to benefit from other styles of play. How he should be main man not second fiddle"

Really piss Man U off