Striker Striker oh levy give us a Striker!
A brief view from the Park
Lane Spurs.
Is it me of does August 2012
seems incredibly similar to the predicament we were facing in August 2011?
The sulking Luka Modric
training with the reserves with no deal in sight. An incredible sense of frustration
of not securing a striker in December when champion’s league football was there
for the taking and every player under the sun linked with us.
So to August 2012, where do
we stand?
We have made two solid
signings in Jan Vertonghen and Gylfi Sigurdsson to which both I’m very happy with.
The sacking of old ‘arry with
his offensive views about the fans and a new young manager in AVB with a lot of
baggage and entrenched in his defensive high line.
Some squad problems with overload of midfield players
who are unwanted (Jenas, Bentley, possibly Huddlestone)
Finally a frighteningly weak
strike force of Kane and Defoe in comparison to the other top 6 clubs.
So who do we need?
Demba Ba
It baffles me why we did not
try and release the Demba Ba clause, he was affordable and when played as the
focal striker produced some excellent performances for Newcastle.
He was reportedly available
for around £7.5million which would of allowed the possibility of securing another
top target.
Fernando Llorente
Or
why not secure Llorente
the target man ideal for us (he has just refused to sign a new contract
with Bilbao)? Reportedly available for around £25 million.
He scored 17 goals in 32
league appearances for Bilbao last season and scored seven in 15 games in
European competition.
Leandro Damiao
I’m personally not so sure
about Leandro Damiao he is more of a predator than the focal point which AVB
tends to prefer.
However the close close links
with Internacional could enable Levy to negotiate the reported staggering
£47mill asking price.
Emmanuel Adebayor
A solid proven goal scorer
but tends to need 4 chances to score 1 and on his day almost unplayable.
Reportedly a fee has been
agreed but the player refusing to lose a penny of his staggering £220k a week,
Hugo Lloris
A top keeper to replace Brad but £25million seems very expensive.
Julio Cesar
At
32 at the peak of his career, with a solid club and international
record this I think would the better purchase in value at approx
£15million.
In reality any potential big
purchase seems to hinge purely on the epic Modric saga, with levy leaving it so
late yet again.
Surely the more astute
business is to agree these deals at a earlier stage allowing any incoming players
to have at least a couple of pre season games to gel with the team (we all
remember the first two games of 2011/12).
Hopefully he sees the huge investments
being made yet again by our top 6 competitors and sanctions the funds needed to keep up.
The squad in reality is still
a very strong one, with the two new additions and hopefully one or two
strikers we can challenge for that 4th spot again.
