Rants about City strikers.. and a bit about Billy Sharp

I am more baffled at people wanting Cook and Sharp together... who's going to do the running?

 

Cook like he has all season long? (I’m not advocating Sharp but Cook has run his arse off all season and also has enough pace to trouble most L2 defenders over ten yards in and around the box - think goals at Gillingham, Mansfield and Hartlepool where he ran at his men)

 

Cook had a fluke season goal tally-wise. The same won't happen again next season and he didn't close players down by himself. He was supported by Gillied and Walker when closing down

 

Subs will do more running warming up to give them a rest

 

Patterson, Walker, Chapman.

 

Maybe but he was still averaging not far off 1 in 2 for City before his stellar season and I'm more than confident he'd get 20+ again next year if we can give him the service.

He's a very good striker at this level and it's about time some on here started giving him the credit he deserves.

 

We’ll see, you’re right he’s not likely to repeat the levels he has this year but the point was about the running up top.
He barely stopped running all season, might not be the quickest, but certainly put the yards in.
I doubt we’ll sign Sharp let alone play the two together so a moot point really.

 

Has he signed yet, then??

 

Never gonna happen

 

Fair play to him, he’s turned himself around since he was dropped. Maybe a kick up the arse and an arm round his shoulder was all that was needed.

 

He'd scored 16 in 23 games before he was dropped, hardly needed a kick up the arse or an arm round him.

 

Perhaps you could explain why he was dropped.?

 

In my eyes Hughes wanted his signing to play and used a poor performance against Carlisle as an excuse.

Does 16 in 23 suggest he needed a kick up the arse too you ?

 

So he was dropped because he wanted Oliver to play. Is that your suggestion?

 

Sorry kev but I disagree again. I think he's always been at a good level since he signed.

The overweight nonsense comes up every time he has a barren run but imo is just that, nonsense.

Look at his record since joining, it's very good and for me, if a striker puts the ball in the net then he's doing a job.

I've added a screenshot of Haalands record since May which includes the CL semis, the FA Cup final and the CL final. Now, I'm obviously not comparing the two but not one person is questioning why Haaland didn't run the channels in those games or only touched the ball 8 times in 90 minutes.

I suppose what I'm trying to say is that Cook is a goalscorer and imo, he's one of a very few we have that I can have absolutely no complaints about over his entire time here.

 

I never mentioned the weight issue. I think you are mixing me up with some other contributors . The issue was … Why was he dropped . ?

 

I don't think he was dropped as such, more that Hughes felt he needed to be rested. Whether that decision was right or wrong is the question.

 

It was right, look at the response?

 

Fair enough. I've just read it on here plenty of times and feels similar to the times Windass and Blake were hammered despite contributing more than most.

As to the reason he was dropped, I suppose you'd have to ask MH but my thoughts at the time were similar to @Goose whereby I think that Hughes wanted to play his own signing and get him doing the job he obviously believed he could do when he signed him.

That didn't work out of course and Cook once again went on to make himself undroppable. I certainly don't think there was any inspired managerial decision behind it to somehow reinvigorate Cook, in fact quite the opposite. I thought it was a mistake at the time and I still do now.

 

The Cook scenario and the views on it, for me it was clear a Hughes dropped him after his poor performance at Carlisle but then quickly realised it was an error as he was that important to any success the club might have.