Edin Dzeko

[sergiokun]

I stated on this thread that dzekos attitude is appalling and it started at Newcastle away. Everyone said I was nuts and full of shit. Well now everyone seems to agree.

Looks like he decided to give up, and wait for summer transfer.

He is doing a good job at getting his price tag down

 

[ElanJo]

His attitude is irrelevant. He is not good enough. He is for us what Huntelaar was to Real. A decent finisher and a good top 6 team striker masquerading as a title chaser.

He's gone. The worry I have is that will Cavani, who looks most likely to replace him, be more of the same? Whilst he looks more mobile than Dzeko, he, from what I've seen at least, also doesn't look particularly gifted technically. Added to that, his goalscoring record outside of Napoli isn't that great (granted it is sensational at Napoli) and Napoli play a very different style and system of football to us. Something for tptb to contemplate

 

[noise]

Dortmund will have some transfer cash to spare after Lewandowski and Gotze sales. According to some articles from today (<a class="postlink" href="http://sg.sports.yahoo.com/news/life-gotze-22m-dzeko-signing-spark-much-dortmund-083000170--spt.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://sg.sports.yahoo.com/news/life-go ... --spt.html</a>), Dzeko will accept lower wages and Dortmund is willing to offer £22m (5m less than what we got him for).

If this is true, I don't have any doubt Dzeko will be back in Bundesliga after this season is over.

 

[LoveCity]

£22million would be a remarkable fee considering we overpaid in the first place (as we have for so many). In the end I can see it being less than that but if we do get £22million that is more than most of us would expect and will help our transfer kitty this summer.

 

[blueinsa]

Not even Txiki and Soriano will manage to bag £22m for him and they do know how to wheel and deal.

Bundesliga bound without a doubt but yet another player we will take a hit on im afraid due to him being well.....dog shit for the most.

 

[noise]

£22million would be a remarkable fee considering we overpaid in the first place (as we have for so many). In the end I can see it being less than that but if we do get £22million that is more than most of us would expect and will help our transfer kitty this summer.

I agree, Wolfsburg really milked that deal. 22m would be good. With the funds from Mario and Dzeko sales, we could get one established striker, and maybe promote Guidetti as a backup.

The rest should be spent on bolstering our midfield.

 

[Marvin]

£22million would be a remarkable fee considering we overpaid in the first place (as we have for so many). In the end I can see it being less than that but if we do get £22million that is more than most of us would expect and will help our transfer kitty this summer.

I agree, Wolfsburg really milked that deal. 22m would be good. With the funds from Mario and Dzeko sales, we could get one established striker, and maybe promote Guidetti as a backup.

The rest should be spent on bolstering our midfield.

We don't need a midfielder. Maybe another left back as cover for Clichy, a wide forward and an out and out striker.

I haven't got any issues with Dzeko's quality. If you put Mario Gomez in our team, he'd struggle. The other way of dealing with it would be to slightly change our style of play, and get him playing again. He has scored a good number of goals for City, it's just that hos attitude has not been right on the pitch for 2-3 months now.

Adebayor, Balotelli and now Dzeko. Perhaps this tells us that it's not the players but trying to fit 4 strikers into 2 starting places.

We've been accumulating star players these last 2-3 seasons. Perhaps what needs to change is the mix in the City squad between established stars, and younger players who have different expectations.

I thought we'd be in trouble with our forwards when we got Knocked out of Europe, but that problem should have been solved by the sale of Balotelli

 

[LoveCity]

We don't need a midfielder.

Go and rewatch our European games, our decrepit looking midfield looked second rate and was completely overrun - even our one genuine top class CMF, Yaya Toure, looked poor against Gundogan. If it was me an elite holding midfielder would be high on the agenda this summer as this position is vital in Europe. It doesn't matter that we have loads of them already, none of them are elite level. United are weak there too and look at them in Europe vs. Premier League.

Our highest tackles-per-game midfielder is Gareth Barry on 2 successful tackles per game. He is our best holding midfielder at the moment. Compare to Arturo Vidal who averages 5.1 tackles per game, Luis Gustavo (Bayern BACKUP midfielder) who averages 2.6 tackles per game, Sandro (Spurs) who averages 3.6 tackles per game, Xabi Alonso who averages 3.3 tackles per game, Lars Bender who averages 4.6 tackles per game. The young lad we're being linked with Kondogbia even averages 2.7 tackles per game. You'll struggle to find any reputable holding midfielder who averages less tackles than our best holding midfielder. And considering Yaya (1.2 tackles per game - so his and Barry's COMBINED tackle count is lower than some European midfielders) does not like to get stuck in, it's pretty important we have a good tackler next to him.

Not that tackles are the only important thing but you'll find most elite level central midfielders offer a better passing range too and some of them like Vidal (9 assists, 11 goals) offer a real attacking threat also. Our midfield is good enough for many Premier League games but even there you can see the frailties when we come up against a mobile pressing unit like Southampton. And that sluggishness going forward against 10 man defences would be overcome easier by a better midfield.

BTW, Garcia averages 1.1 tackles per game which is an astonishingly poor stat for a player whose only apparent quality is breaking up play. De Jong was averaging 2.4 tackles before his season-ending injury. Milner, who is famous for his tenacity and closing down, only averages 1.4 tackles too.

Honestly Marvin, I think you're too quick to accept mediocrity sometimes, you even bigged up Adam Johnson who wouldn't make a top 50 wingers in Europe list. If we want to be the best we should aspire to have the best players, not just "make do". And the best players don't even have to cost a bomb, Lars Bender for example would probably cost £15million.

 

[taconinja]

His attitude is irrelevant. He is not good enough. He is for us what Huntelaar was to Real. A decent finisher and a good top 6 team striker masquerading as a title chaser.

He's gone. The worry I have is that will Cavani, who looks most likely to replace him, be more of the same? Whilst he looks more mobile than Dzeko, he, from what I've seen at least, also doesn't look particularly gifted technically. Added to that, his goalscoring record outside of Napoli isn't that great (granted it is sensational at Napoli) and Napoli play a very different style and system of football to us. Something for tptb to contemplate

Cavani works like Tevez works. You would NEVER see a display out of him like you saw from Dzeko at Tottenham this past week. Never. He will always be an outlet and he will always harass their holding midfielders instead of just lazing about while they pick the perfect pass.

 

[Jim Tolmie's Underpants]

We don't need a midfielder.