Why are hard working strikers praised but clinical and “lazy strikers” criticised?
The Premier League is littered with examples of strikers that work hard – but offer little in terms of goals. The classic examples are Emile Heskey, Dirk Kuyt and Kevin Davies, it’s probably fair to say that all of those players have shown glimpses of class and ability at times that has led to the suggestion they are half-decent strikers. But none of them have proved to be able to score more than 14 goals in a single Premier League season. Yet, they have all played in the Premier League for years and are highly respected.
Now call me old fashioned but I believe a striker should hit the back of the net on a regular basis or they are simply not doing their job. Two players that have done that on a regular basis throughout their respected careers are Darren Bent and Dimitar Berbatov, but both these players have their critics and they are often considered lazy. However, surely the goals they score tell their own story and should be more than enough to answer any critics?
Whenever Heskey, Kuyt or Davies is criticised we hear about the amount of ground they cover or the overall work they do for the team. It was this sort of thinking that resulted in Emile Heskey going to the World Cup with England. Isn’t it time we started to praise the strikers that score the goals and do the job and criticise the ones that don’t?
Managers must see something in training that I don’t – because I would never pick a forward with a high work rate but poor goal return and leave my prolific marksman on the bench. It makes no sense to me when football is all about scoring goals to win games. But maybe I am missing the point and the value of the likes of Kuyt, Heskey and Davies.
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You may have noticed that Kuyt has been playing as a right winger for the last 4 years, rather disingenous to include him with Heskey & Davies.
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As well as the fact Kuyt has been playing out of position, it may be worth noting things like assists (more goals for the team of course) and also harrying defenders (regaining posession) and tracking back (lessening the risk of conceding). These factors all contribute to final scores of games and by those standards Kuyt is a god whereas Berbatov for example is a lazy useless bugger
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Are you blind or what?? Do you even know in which position Kuyt played currently? Pls for our sake stop writing about football!
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If football is all about scoring goals to win games, why do you think we have defenders and midfielders in the team? You can as well have 11 the so called ‘prolific marksman’ in the team and win games? If you think that midfielders are essential to the team you don’t have to go anywhere else to find out why a hardworking striker is rated more than a lazy marksman who just taps in the ball to the net. In other words Kuyts and Tevezs and Saurezes help the team in lot other ways than tapping in the ball.
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