Player Watch: Fernando Llorente

ButchCassidy said:

As it stands he looks like he will be the best free-agent striker on the market. Somebody will definitely overpay to land him after missing out on their preferred targets.

Click to expand...

hughy said:

I don't believe this "the style we will be playing this season won't suit his game" nonsense. The idea of having him in the squad wasn't to be stylish, but was to have another 6'+ body who was capable of causing some problems in the final minutes if we're chasing a game. A good few times last season it worked perfectly, and it's an option we suddenly lack again.

I don't know whether it was a disagreement about length of contract/wage demands, but I'm disappointed we seemingly aren't looking at re-signing him. Quite frankly if it was between him and Wanyama for the final PL/CL squad place I'd choose Llorente every day.

Click to expand...

WiganSpur said:

If we want somebody for the sake of being tall then we can tempt Crouch out of retirement or just sign a lamp post for much cheaper. He has nothing else to his game anymore.

The only argument for resigning him seems to be his size rather than footballing ability which is bonkers. If you want a proper secondary option like that, you sign Mandzukic, Dzeko or Giroud who are actually decent at football too and worth changing a game plan to get the best out of.

Click to expand...

hughy said:

Are any of the players you mentioned available to us? No one can deny Llorente made a contribution last season, strikers of a similar profile to him have joined teams at our level and done far, far worse.

He's not going to do the 90 minute press, and he certainly isn't going to chase down every through ball, but you know what you get from him, and in our case it was a huge hand to CL qualification for this season and a CL Final.

Click to expand...

WiganSpur said:

No they aren't, but my point is if they aren't then why does it mean we have to sign anybody? If we cannot get anyone who is up to standard then we shouldn't sign them, simple. We've got 3 top class number tens, two great inside forwards and plenty of footballers further back too. We've got a team of Dele Alli, Lamela, Lo Celso, Eriksen, Lucas, Son etc. and you're saying let's just lump the ball forward to accommodate who would be our worst player by far. If we do ever want to change it up, then what's wrong with crossing it to Kane, Alli, even Lucas who is decent in the air?

Why completely change your game plan to the detriment of the whole team to accommodate a barely PL standard Llorente? It screams nothing but panic late in a game. Do you see Pep do it? Klopp? This is just one of many many reasons why we should not re-sign Llorente.

Click to expand...

hughy said:

Why does it matter what Liverpool and City do? If it was an effective tactic used last season why do you sound so embarrassed to use it? We're you embarrassed when we lumped the ball forward to Llorente for Lucas' winner against Ajax?


It's a worthwhile option which worked for us on occasion last season, there's no denying that.

Click to expand...

hughy said:

Why does it matter what Liverpool and City do? If it was an effective tactic used last season why do you sound so embarrassed to use it? We're you embarrassed when we lumped the ball forward to Llorente for Lucas' winner against Ajax?


It's a worthwhile option which worked for us on occasion last season, there's no denying that.

Click to expand...

dtxspurs said:

He was really bad 90% of the time. Let them have him.

Click to expand...

Clark28 said:

I love Nado, but if we're playing Utd and they bring him on, I won't be shitting bricks that's for sure.

Click to expand...

sausage said:

I hope we don't relapse into Llorente.

Kane is equally good at being a target man, we just don't play that way. Last thing we need is another reason to block Parrott's progress.

Click to expand...