As this is more about canvassing opinion rather than a transfer rumour, thought it would be best to start a new thread. If it belongs on the transfer rumours thread, please feel free to move it across.

I personally think that if we get good service to Jay and Ash, we have 2 decent strikers for this level, however I accept that there are stats and opinions that make my 'gut feel' probably questionable.

I thought Twine was coming in to score goals for us also having done well at a lower level.

My assumption is that Vydra will not sign again with us once treatment completed.

If we need more fire power - realistically who should we be looking at?

If we are relying on Barnes & Rodriguez to shoot us out of the Championship we have a very long wait. If we are skint we need to look at what young strikers are on the fringe of first team action in the top 6. Maybe we have raped Man City so need to look at some of the other big clubs, and go for a loan. Alongside that Joao of Reading who I think we could get for under £2.5m. 35 goals in 80 appearances for Reading. Forget Vydra he has no loyalty to us-if he did then at our offer of us helping him to recover, he would have reciprocated. Get him out as soon as he is fit

Who knows...we may even look beyond City's reserves or the Championship

I suspect we are looking at the European leagues rather than domestic.

Joao at reading is a good shout.

Adebayo at Luton fits the age profile.

Onaucho in the Belgian league could be an interesting one

Giokoumakis at Celtic could be interesting

Honestly can't see either Jay or Ash getting past 10, if they of course stay injury free, but both as we know have become a bit injury prone so in itself is taking a risk. While twine is an excellent signing he's not an out and out striker, but will score goals and possibly finish the season around the 12-15 mark, under normal circumstances a fit vydra would in my opinion represent the best chance of scoring anywhere near 20, but obviously won't be available until at least November. It is slightly concerning at this stage there are no links to anyone, but as things stand we need some pace up top in the mold of Andre Gray. Again as thing's stand we could be looking at one of the younger lads coming through. Good striker's cost good money.

We should be doing all that we can in getting Adam Armstrong on Loan/permanent

There is no way we start the season with what we have up front. We have scored 1 goal in two preseason games. If we can't bring anybody permanently, it will be a loan.

warksclaret wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 11:33 am

If we are relying on Barnes & Rodriguez to shoot us out of the Championship we have a very long wait. If we are skint we need to look at what young strikers are on the fringe of first team action in the top 6. Maybe we have raped Man City so need to look at some of the other big clubs, and go for a loan. Alongside that Joao of Reading who I think we could get for under £2.5m. 35 goals in 80 appearances for Reading. Forget Vydra he has no loyalty to us-if he did then at our offer of us helping him to recover, he would have reciprocated. Get him out as soon as he is fit

Using 'raped' casually as a verb is crass at best. You can do much better.

CoolClaret wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 11:43 am

We should be doing all that we can in getting Adam Armstrong on Loan/permanent

Not a bad shout, maybe him and twine could link up well, but not sure if Armstrong is an out and out number 9, what we really need is an old fashioned no 9 in the mould of pukki for example imo.

Domestic:
Adam Armstrong
Viktor Gyökeres
Rory Delap

Foreign:
Kelvin Yeboah (Nephew of Tony, Scored 17 in 34 for Sturm Graz last season, only 22, Italy U21 International)
Zeki Amdouni (Only 21, scored 12 in 34 for mid table side in Swiss Super League, owned by FC Basel)

How about Emil Riis Jakobsen from Preston? He got 16 league goals last season for a terrible side, just turned 24. I saw them on TV a few times and he bailed them out often. Tall, strong, decent turn of pace and scored different types of goals.

Preston have nothing to play for and no money, he would be a much cheaper alternative to the likes of Gyokeres etc.

what_no_pies wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 11:45 am

Using 'raped' casually as a verb is crass at best. You can do much better.

Point taken and apologies-substitute with pillaged

UpTheClaretsFCBK wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 11:52 am

Domestic:
Adam Armstrong
Viktor Gyökeres
Rory Delap

Foreign:
Kelvin Yeboah (Nephew of Tony, Scored 17 in 34 for Sturm Graz last season, only 22, Italy U21 International)
Zeki Amdouni (Only 21, scored 12 in 34 for mid table side in Swiss Super League, owned by FC Basel)

Gyokeres is 15m+
Rory Delap - thought we were going away from the Dyche ball percentages and long throws

Jay clearly still has a touch of class, IF he can stay fit he should get double figures easily with decent service . Re: Barnes , presume he’l go out on loan with maybe JBG? We’re clearly looking for bargains so i’d expect another good low leaguer to rock up . Concerning we don’t appear to have made much effort at keeping our better players ie Collins, Roberts , Dwight etc . Though hope springs eternal .

Richardson?

AlargeClaret wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 12:54 pm

Concerning we don’t appear to have made much effort at keeping our better players ie Collins, Roberts , Dwight etc

When did we sell these three, I must of missed that

jedi_master wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 11:57 am

How about Emil Riis Jakobsen from Preston? He got 16 league goals last season for a terrible side, just turned 24. I saw them on TV a few times and he bailed them out often. Tall, strong, decent turn of pace and scored different types of goals.

Preston have nothing to play for and no money, he would be a much cheaper alternative to the likes of Gyokeres etc.

While he's become a bit of a cult hero there, consensus from the PNE fans in the office is that he's a limited player who can go missing for large parts of a game but does have the knack of popping up with a goal. I agree though, he's got the right attributes and a decent age profile.

The dream would be Liam Delap but I can't see it happening because he'd be too expensive and it looks like Southampton are in for him. But if we sold a couple of players for big fees maybe we'd be able to agree a fee with City and convince him a season of guaranteed starts in the Championship under Kompany with buyback/release clauses in his contract would be the best step for his career.

I think Joao is the most realistic and affordable option out there.

Would love to sign Obafemi at Swansea but can't see that being affordable.

Personally I think Jay would bag 15+ as our starting striker in the Championship if he stayed fit and then maybe we'd be able to afford opportunities to Richardson, Costelloe, Mellon etc.

I think the striker profile we need is someone who will play on the shoulder like Wood / Gray / Ings did. Barnes, Jay and Twine are all more suited to dropping deeper and linking play. But to stretch teams, especially with Kompany favouring through balls etc rather than cross spamming, you need someone who can make those runs in behind.

Mattster wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 1:13 pm

The dream would be Liam Delap but I can't see it happening because he'd be too expensive and it looks like Southampton are in for him. But if we sold a couple of players for big fees maybe we'd be able to agree a fee with City and convince him a season of guaranteed starts in the Championship under Kompany with buyback/release clauses in his contract would be the best step for his career.

I think Joao is the most realistic and affordable option out there.

Would love to sign Obafemi at Swansea but can't see that being affordable.

Personally I think Jay would bag 15+ as our starting striker in the Championship if he stayed fit and then maybe we'd be able to afford opportunities to Richardson, Costelloe, Mellon etc.

I really really struggle to see Jay scoring more than 10. He’s so far past it now.

Newcastleclaret93 wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 1:29 pm

I really really struggle to see Jay scoring more than 10. He’s so far past it now.

He is 32 not 45

Billy Sharp is 36 and scored 14 in the league last season while not playing all the games

For what it’s worth, I thought the team looked a lot better, in general, when Jay was in the 11 last season. Can’t rely on him to play 46 games next season but I reckon he’ll easily get more than 10 and probably close to 15. He’d likely be the penalty taker too.

claretonthecoast1882 wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 1:36 pm

He is 32 not 45

Billy Sharp is 36 and scored 14 in the league last season while not playing all the games

He very well might do it. I just personally don’t think he looks half the player he did two years ago. He missed some real sitters this season. He should be third choice at best in my opinion.

Newcastleclaret93 wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 1:43 pm

He very well might do it. I just personally don’t think he looks half the player he did two years ago. He missed some real sitters this season. He should be third choice at best in my opinion.

Also in Billy Sharp's previous 2 seasons at Prem level he got 3 a season.

I am not expecting him to be 1st choice but to claim he is so far past it is just a bit daft

Flo Balogun from Arsenal could be a shout. Got a taste of the Championship last season with Boro. 3 goals 3 assists in 900 minutes which works out to be 1 in 3 for goals and 1 in 1.5 for goal contributions. Regular scorer in the Prem u23 league.

Newcastleclaret93 wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 1:29 pm

I really really struggle to see Jay scoring more than 10. He’s so far past it now.

Disagree, guess we'll see.

Patrick Bamford would fit perfectly into our new system.

I think people forget the gulf in quality between the PL and the Championship. Rodriguez would easily get into double figures as a regular starter.

The likes of Lewis Grabban, Billy Sharp, Dominic Solanke, Danny Ward, Chris Martin, Andrea's Wieman were in the top 20 goalscrores in the Championship last season. Lets not kid ourselves, the standard of the Championship is terrible, the gulf between the two divisions is very wide, both Jay Rod and Barnes will score lots in this league

Cleveleys_claret wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 2:50 pm

The likes of Lewis Grabban, Billy Sharp, Dominic Solanke, Danny Ward, Chris Martin, Andrea's Wieman were in the top 20 goalscrores in the Championship last season. Lets not kid ourselves, the standard of the Championship is terrible, the gulf between the two divisions is very wide, both Jay Rod and Barnes will score lots in this league

I'd trade Rodriguez and Barnes for Solanke all day long, good player is Solanke.

on Solanke its crazy people are so quick to write young kids off, he was how old at Bournemouth in the PL? 20/21? upfront in a poor side, he barely played football prior to that season. Thrown in at the deep end as a kid, first proper run in a side in 4 years (since a successful loan at Vitesse as a 17/18 year old). I always rated him, thought Bournemouth got a very good deal in the long run, 29 in 46 last season, just takes a breakout year for the kids to learn.

I think Brewster will be good too in the long run. Infact I'd take Brewster here, there's a player in there.

Armstrong would be ideal, and something diffrent to what we have.
Someone who can plsy on the shoulder of the defence always seems invaluable in this league.
Defenders fear of players getting in behind gets you 20 yards nearer their goal, and if it doesn't you will get 1 right in a game.

Andre Gray thrived on that.

If we want to poach from the lower leagues, which does seem to be our current strategy, Harry McKirdy at Swindon might be worth a look, scored 22 last season. still only 25, and more importantly has only 12 months remaining on his contract, so he shouldn't break the bank by any means, now whether he could make the step up 2 divisions is the biggest question, and that I simply don't know.

Lucas Joao. Reading need cash, 1 year left on contract, proven quality championship striker for 3 years running. Available for 3m. Where else are we going to get that for that fee?

I'm expecting a striker in from the Belgium league, which VK will know much better than the lower leagues here, plus will have seen several times up close and personal.

I certainly don't think Jay or Ash are the answer, but I do think Vydra could play a part if he stays.

Difficult for us to identify a striker before we know what system Kompany will deploy. We'd all love another Danny Ings type striker but the reality is Kompanys system could suit a poacher like an Austin rather than a player who can pick the ball up deep and run with it.

ClaretMov wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 11, 2022 1:01 pm

When did we sell these three, I must of missed that

Well we’ve sold/released all our main assets with Cornet surely to follow . As for Brownhill /Dwight/Roberts , they’re clearly available . I’d imagine at least 2 will hopefully stay though . I’d have preferred a nucleus of our 2021/22 squad being ringfenced for stability if nothing else .

Charlie Austin.

Natural born goal scorers cost a lot of money, unless you seek them in the lower leagues, and then they are untested at our level. It's a conundrum.

I should imagine we would find a lot more reliable for our money in Europe, but then it's a case of knowing the market, and are they willing to play in the championship.

If Josh Cullen is our modern version of Joey Barton, then we must find the next Andre Gray. Incidentally AG was playing at Hinckley Utd when first scouted by Luton, where he scored a load of goals, then did the same again for Brentford. He hit the ground running with us, whereas Ings & Austin took some time to get going

Obafemi at Swansea looked a real handful in the recent Nations League games, he was incredible against Scotland. Sure Vincent will have seen a few in Belgium, then the likes of Zirkzee who played under him on loan?

Lucas juao, proven in the championship, big, strong knows where the net is, and scores different types of goals. Bit of pace, bit of skill, good header of the ball, what's not to like.

I wish Andy Payton,was only 21 years old,now there is a proper Natural Born Claret,what a goalscorer,I also had the teeshirt,with no 10 on the back,Natural Born Claret on the front,wore it for years!

No need to target anyone,just give Vydra a new contract and play him

What about Tyrese Campbell of Stoke City. Had a serious injury last season which had an impact but now fully recovered. Prior to his injury he was playing well