Viktor Gyokeres: Page 64 - The Arsenal discussion forum and community: One More in the Tolly

Viktor Gyokeres

Don Pacifico

Klaus If he'd gotten the penalty call against Newcastle and the shot against Olympiakos had bounced off the post and into the net instead of serving Martinelli with a tap-in from two yards no one would be complaining right now

Dunno mate, that's a bit like saying if he'd not hit his shot at the 'keeper, he would have scored. In that scenario, I'd mark that down as a disappointing attempt. We should be expecting him to put that away.

FEBravo imagine if we had Sesko instead.

Sesko has exactly the same goals per minute ratio in the PL right now (1 per 193 minutes) and a superior shot to goal conversion rate (all whilst playing for United). I'd expect that to have swung in VK's favour by the end of the season but at the moment, not like either of them are winning the Golden Boot.

JazzG

Don Pacifico Saw something on Twitter that he had a good game against Sunderland.

We tried for him, RB Leipzig and the player were clearly not being serious so we moved on, not overly bothered about him because he was clearly overpriced and the player and his agent clearly thought a bit too much of themselves.

Klaus

Don Pacifico Dunno mate, that's a bit like saying if he'd not hit his shot at the 'keeper, he would have scored.

On the other hand if he hadn't taken that shot - and I don't think any other player on our books would have - we wouldn't have scored, I think it's that simple. That ties back into having a striker who occupies the right spaces and generates these opportunities. It set up Martinelli for a free goal this time; next time it's in the net. From a team perspective it's the same.

Meatwad

Don Pacifico
the only real benefit of viktor over sesko right now is that we will not persist with viktor if he's a dud. too old for that. with sesko we could fall into the young potential trap and persist with a dud for years.

on just the eye test ekitike seems like the real miss. i imagine if we had won a title in the past few years we would have gone with elite potential, but because we need to win this season they went with the guy who is not a developmental prospect.

Qwiss

QuincyAbeyie well their 2 better strikers have scored between them the same number og goals as Gyokeres. The way I see it Gyokeres has come in and we are better. Their strikers have come in and they are worse. And they spent £200m or so on them.

QuincyAbeyie

Qwiss I don't think that's a good way to evaluate which striker is better if that's what you're doing, but I addressed that here:

QuincyAbeyie Luckily we have them beat in plenty of other positions on the field - and if we assume that we spent all we could spend this summer, we might have that squad precisely due to going for a cheaper striker option.

If you're going by numbers Ekitike has a goal involvement every 99th minute in the league so far and Gyokeres every 195th, but I think it's way too early to use numbers like that since a single goal/assist can swing the numbers wildly so I just go by what I see.

Don Pacifico

Klaus I mean, yes kinda. We do need a CF to be shooting and we do need them to occupy defenders, both of which create opportunities for the team. But I think we can also expect our first choice to put some of those chances away. If not, we're setting a low bar.

I've seen a lot of people say it's fine if VK is a flat track bully because it's those teams we dropped points to. I think that somewhat misses the point as I think the issue we have as a team is less about opposition and more about game state (eg. the first goal is always the hardest one to score). The matches we dropped points in were tight affairs where we didn't create many chances (opposition low block, our system broke down etc.), which happened against teams of all calibre. I want our starting striker to be reliable in those clutch moments as it won't always create an opening for other players. I don't think that's too much to ask for.

Klaus

Qwiss And TBH I'm not so sure Isak is about to have a better season than Gyokeres.

I reckon Isak is going to find out this season what it means when things are actually expected of him. He's 26 and has never carried a team before. Salah is aging out on them now and Wirtz is a dud who can't cope with pressure. They'll look to the guy who scored 22 goals last season and I think they'll find him wanting. I've watched him closely for about 10 years, and this is not a bloke who shoulders responsibility or does any sort of dirty work when the going gets tough. Any tough away game with Sweden used to be a wash with him up front until Gyökeres showed up.

Bernard Woolley

Meatwad Yes, but there were a lot of doubts on here (including in my mind) on the price, transferability from Frankfurt (which has been an issue for many strikers), physicality and fit for EPL, etc. It wasn't obvious at all that he would settle in as quickly as he has. I still think we made the right choice and if VG is a dud and we need to upgrade in 2-3 years, we can look again at the time - there seems to be a slight resurgence of the lone striker vs 2-3 years ago.

flobaba

Do we have an idea how he's doing compared to his xG so far?

Irishgunner

3 goals from 4 xG

https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/articles/cdx2750g617o

flobaba

Irishgunner

Looks like it's actually xG of 3, goals scored 3.

https://fbref.com/en/squads/18bb7c10/Arsenal-Stats

Either way, it shows he isn't doing poorly so far. There's room for improvement of course, and for me to classify his season as successful by the end of the season, I expect him to outscore his xG.

Sicario2

This is coming from one of the greatest penalty box strikers of all time

awooga83

Sicario2 I mean he seems to suggest what we've said that he will get goals because we are a good team and create plenty of chances not necessarily saying Gyokeres himself is anything special

Burnwinter

Bernard Woolley It wasn't obvious at all that he would settle in as quickly as he has.

Says a bit the debate isn't really whether Gyökeres can come good or if he's any good at all, but whether he's elite.

I don't think Gyökeres will be elite based on what we've seen, but he's looked the part. I'd take what he's done for us over what Wirtz has done for Liverpool to date for twice the fee.

banduan

He's clearly not on the same wavelength still with the others. Just count the number of times passes go behind him when he's attacking the box.

lorddulaarsenal

I think we need to get him peeling wide more often.

Bring Back Kerrea Gilbert

lorddulaarsenal make room for Calafiori Express.

Don Pacifico

Burnwinter Says a bit the debate isn't really whether Gyökeres can come good or if he's any good at all, but whether he's elite.

Wasn't that always the debate? We're trying to win our first league title in over 20 years and maybe (whisper it quietly) win a Champions League so getting the best players is a relevant benchmark. I don't think many (any?) doubted whether he could play in the PL, it was whether he'd be a goalscorer of serious repute (as per his hype).

RowJimmy

Don Pacifico I don't think many (any?) doubted whether he could play in the PL, it was whether he'd be a goalscorer of serious repute (as per his hype).

Which in turn moves the debate to another ground, whether we need a "good" striker or an "elite" striker to win the league etc.
My personal opinion is that our squad is built to win the league without an "elite" striker. But this puts a cap on how good Gyökeres can be for us because we're not set up to feed a classic 9, and it would be foolish to change our structure for anyone short of Haaland (and frankly I think Pep was wrong to do so with City - they were a better team before him).

Don Pacifico

RowJimmy I'm assessing him as an individual. Yes, the team can (and has) won without him scoring goals but you don't buy the top goalscorer in Europe if you weren't expecting him to significantly contribute on the goals front. If that's not a relevant criteria then we could have bought plenty other options out there, for a fair bit less money.

Honestly, all the arguments abdicating him of responsibility for scoring goals are a bit mystifying to me.

Burnwinter

I think these categories are too abstract.

We paid £60m and got a player who has slotted in during Havertz's injury absence, and will offer a tactical option or a useful rotation when Havertz is back. He's better than a mere backup such as an Nketiah.

The decision to sign Gyökeres can be rationalised in its greater context, alongside factors like league readiness, "specificity" or other signings. And it has many strengths given that context. For example most people don't say "what about Isak?" partly because we infer Isak would've meant no Eze.

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