Should we Buy Dean Ashton? Forgeddaboutit!

[Offshore]

My pecking order of strikers in the EPL that 'could' be available from the pool that we could reasonably attract from.....Bent, Crouch then Ashton.

 

 

 

At last someone quoting alternatives. Bent, I'm not so sure about, got to say. He can look awful sometimes, but I guess every player can, I haven't seen the game but from what's been said Ashton most certainly did against T&T.

 

Crouch, maybe, I think he could be a success, think he'll end up at Villa though in the Barry deal.

 

Bent - Good at Charlton, got a big move but not many games. Although the little I did see of him he still looks a canny player and seems to have a bit of pace.

Crouch - Big, gangly, not that great a touch for a premiership player but scores goals when played. Would do a canny job for us.

Ashton - Still getting over a bad injury, hard to say if he's injury prone or was just unlucky to be at West Ham who are the unluckiest team in regards to players getting injuried. Again, a canny player, if fully over his injury he'd do a good job for us, but I reckon any potential buyers will, unless its getting to the end of the transfer window and are getting desperate, wait another season to see how he's fairing.

 

All three would fit in with playing the centre role in a 4-3-3

 

Not the most exciting list tbh but probably the best from the premiership we can expect given our status at this time.

 

 

[Cajun]

Yep Ashton should leave that injury curse of a club that is West Ham and come here

[Offshore]

Yep Ashton should leave that injury curse of a club that is West Ham and come here

 

To be fair, they make us (or anyone) look like Lazarus utd...

[indi]

We won't do much better than Ashton. Even with his injury record, we won't be able to attract better. Paying upto 10 mill for him is a risk we have to take. It might very well not come off, but we have little choice but to take the risk.

 

I disagree, we also have a choice not to take the risk. I know it sounds crazy but I think it could be done.

 

I know I haven't really explained myself there. I'll try make some sense for once.

 

I rate Dean Ashton, he's a quality player, he could very well be a huge player for this club, but he's got an injury record, this makes him a risk.

 

I don't see anyone out there, with a proven ability in the PL, who can have as big an impact in the role of CF and that we realistically could attract, than Ashton.

 

A strong target man is just what we need, since we really can't rely on Viduka, and Ashton fits the bill completely.

 

It's a risk and at 10 mill a huge risk, but a risk I think we must take if we want to progress.

 

But as I said earlier, I think we are being used here to bump up his contract offer.

 

Or we could all stop living in the past, get over this "We absolutely must have a big target-man up front" thing, stop relying on the "tactic" of booting the ball up the pitch in the general direction of some big lump and praying for a miracle that is him getting the better of the opposition's defenders considering the vast majority of premiership centre-halves can deal with that all day long, get the team playing some decent passing football and try and move away from being the one-dimensional bottom-half cloggers we seem to have become over the last few years.

 

Dean Ashton is a big step backwards in my view.

 

I think you're seriously under-estimating Ashton there. Yes, he plays as a target man, but his touch on the ball is absolutely superb, and he's very comfortable when the ball is played on the deck.

 

You're right I don't rate him much, at all. But even if I did, for the kind of money we'd be talking about to get him we could get players who are much better at that kind of stuff than he is. Ashton's value gets inflated for a number of reasons, including, but not limited to: "he's English", and; "he's the new Shearer", neither of which are relevant and one of which isn't even close to being true!!

 

We'll never play route 1 football under KK, I honestly don't know what you are going on about. He signed 2 big target men in the past for us, Sir Les and Big Al, and at no point did we play the long ball game.

 

You need diversity in your attack to open up defences, Ashton offers us something different to Martins and Owen. KK values that, his best partnership as a player was when he played for Liverpool with John Toshack (sp?), the big man little man combo worked so well and they won 2 European Cups with it.

 

Bottom line is he's a damn good player, he's proven that in the PL, it's nothing to do with him being English or in the same mould as Shearer, it's to do with his ability and he fills one of our needs.

 

If we're never going to play route one, why is it such a desperate need to have a "strong target man"? As for the 2 big target men he signed for us in the past, both Sir Les and Big Al were so much more than that, they were light years ahead of Ashton. They were great players that also happened to be target men, I'm not so sure that applies to Ashton, he's not what I'd call prolific when it comes to top flight football, unlike those two.

 

Hopefully Keegan realises that football's moved on a bit since the 70s and what worked well then, isn't so good now, big-man/little-man who cares!?! Let's have good-man/good-man, over average-big-man/good-man any day.

 

My bottom line is that I don't think he's that good a player, I don't think he's proven in the Premiership and I think this whole proven in the Premiership thing is bollocks anyway. Yeah, there are different demands playing here than some of the other leagues, but that doesn't mean players from those leagues can't shine here, you just need to have a half decent scouting network and a manager that knows what he's on about to pick them out. Fair enough, we haven't had that in the past, but I reckon we might now, so parochial attitudes about who we should and shouldn't sign, will only hold us back.

 

Then go ahead suggest a better option, that is obtainable by NUFC. Who out there fills our need, or do you think we don't have one? You think Owen and Martins as a paring will work ? I have huge doubts and I don't think for one minute KK has faith in that either. He want's a bigger presence in there.

 

Playing with a big man doesn't mean you have play "70's style football" or route 1 stuff. Labour the point once more please. Arsenal play with a reasonably tall chap up front and are reguarded as perhaps the best footballing side in the land. As someone else pointed out Ashton's game is not just about being the target man, he's good on the deck and goals per game record is pretty decent, just doesn't play enough.

 

I never said he was as good as either Sir Les or Big Al, because he quite clearly isn't but your response was predictable. Sigh. My point, which you chose to ignore was that you can still play pretty "modern" football with a big man or even two in your team.

 

This is not a "oh let's buy him cos he's English" thing, why do you keep bleeting on about that ? 

 

There are numerous better options out there, it's not my job to find them, in fact most of them I haven't got the first clue about at all! That's one of the points I'm making, most of the people offering up Dean Ashton as a good potential signing are only saying that because they know who he is. As a club we need to be casting the net a lot wider than simply the other Premiership sides, it's a lazy and ineffective approach and this is exactly what I'm talking about when I say "parochial attitudes". The best players already in England are out of our reach at the moment, in fact most of the mid-range ones are as well. The ones that are available to us are either no great improvement on what we've already got or worse. They're also really poor value for money. Why is Ashton so much better than Viduka? Even the people who want us to sign him are struggling to come up with an answer to that. My own view is that he isn't better than Viduka, his only advantage is he's younger. I don't see why spending £10m plus on replacing Viduka with someone of a similar or worse level, when hopefully by the time Viduka retires we'll be able to attract someone significantly better, is a good idea. It seems like a pointless waste of money to me.

 

I do think we could do with an additional attacking player, but not a target man. What we really need is a Peter Beardsley type player, someone who can create stuff, but will also chip in with a few goals of their own, someone like Modric (from what I've read) or Arshavin (from what I've seen). Both of those were/are getable in my opinion and if they don't end up here there's others like them out there somewhere, we just need to find them.

 

I'll continue to labour the point about big immobile target-men not being what we need for as long as you continue to labour your point that a big immobile target-man is exactly what we need. I've already said that I disagree with you about Ashton's other abilities being all that good, either accept that's what I think or convince me otherwise, I'm not just going to believe it because you tell me to. As for comparing Adebayor with Ashton, well you're right that they're both quite tall, but that's where the comparison ends I'm afraid. As I've said, this is not about whether a player can be a target man if needed, it's about a player being a target man and nothing else. Adebayor has a lot else to his game, Ashton doesn't, in my view anyway.

 

My point about Ferdinand and Shearer may well have been predictable, but you still seem to have totally missed it. What I'm saying is that Les and Big Al had so much more to their game than simply being a target man, Ashton hasn't. You admit yourself that Ashton simply isn't in their league, yet you continue to use them as examples to back up your argument!! Why isn't he in their league? Because he doesn't have all the other aspects to his game that they did!! This is what makes them legends and him merely an also-ran. You'd be much better comparing him to Duncan Ferguson, as that's a much more appropriate comparison, the only problem is that wouldn't really support your argument for signing him, would it!?!

 

Erm, I'm not bleeting [sic] on about him being English, I've mentioned it once in this conversation. Anyway, I'm bored of this now.

[Parky]

Ashton would be a blunder of really big blunderous proportions.

[TRon]

Cant make my mind up about him. Looks good in certain situations, dogshit in others. Thought he was woeful against Trinidad, slow and immobile with plenty of bad touches/layoffs. Shearer seems to love him though, and although Shearer might be a bit biased given that we're talking about similar types of forwards (huge gap in calibre though), I think he knows his stuff.

 

I would take Peter Crouch over Ashton at this point in time though, purely because hes more likely to stay fit, which means Ameobi and Smith are far less likely to be playing regularly. If those two start 20 odd games, you can guarantee that we wont be in the top half of the Premiership, and I think that alone is worth £10m in terms of preventing.

 

Ashton is similar only to the 30+ version of Alan Shearer, and even then a poor copy. totally different to the world-class shearer we saw before the big injuries took their toll.

 

i don't think it would be worth spending big on Ashton. He has the same flaws as Viduka, poor fitness and poor mobility. he is a bit stronger than the aussie and a bit less skilful and a bit less creative. so on balance i think he wouldn't really be an improvement at all, other than he is younger so could play for longer whereas Viduka will retire sooner.

 

Crouch is another who would perhaps not be a huge improvement over Viduka but i'd much prefer him to Ashton, far better player imo. he has the same problems with movement, he's bloody awful when he has to chase down loose balls out wide trying to provide a bit of width. but he has far less fitness concerns and i think he is better on the ball than Ashton.

 

I agree with both these posts. Ashton always looks a handful when I see him but the prospect of signing him fills me with dread. I always thought Shearer limited our style however good he was, and Ashton is in the same mould. I would far rather have Bent or Crouch if it came to it.

[indi]

Ashton would be a blunder of really big blunderous proportions.

 

A bit like his playing style.

 

(That's a joke by the way, before the Ashton apologists go off on one.)

[mrmojorisin75]

We won't do much better than Ashton. Even with his injury record, we won't be able to attract better. Paying upto 10 mill for him is a risk we have to take. It might very well not come off, but we have little choice but to take the risk.

 

I disagree, we also have a choice not to take the risk. I know it sounds crazy but I think it could be done.

 

I know I haven't really explained myself there. I'll try make some sense for once.

 

I rate Dean Ashton, he's a quality player, he could very well be a huge player for this club, but he's got an injury record, this makes him a risk.

 

I don't see anyone out there, with a proven ability in the PL, who can have as big an impact in the role of CF and that we realistically could attract, than Ashton.

 

A strong target man is just what we need, since we really can't rely on Viduka, and Ashton fits the bill completely.

 

It's a risk and at 10 mill a huge risk, but a risk I think we must take if we want to progress.

 

But as I said earlier, I think we are being used here to bump up his contract offer.

 

Or we could all stop living in the past, get over this "We absolutely must have a big target-man up front" thing, stop relying on the "tactic" of booting the ball up the pitch in the general direction of some big lump and praying for a miracle that is him getting the better of the opposition's defenders considering the vast majority of premiership centre-halves can deal with that all day long, get the team playing some decent passing football and try and move away from being the one-dimensional bottom-half cloggers we seem to have become over the last few years.

 

Dean Ashton is a big step backwards in my view.

 

I think you're seriously under-estimating Ashton there. Yes, he plays as a target man, but his touch on the ball is absolutely superb, and he's very comfortable when the ball is played on the deck.

 

You're right I don't rate him much, at all. But even if I did, for the kind of money we'd be talking about to get him we could get players who are much better at that kind of stuff than he is. Ashton's value gets inflated for a number of reasons, including, but not limited to: "he's English", and; "he's the new Shearer", neither of which are relevant and one of which isn't even close to being true!!

 

We'll never play route 1 football under KK, I honestly don't know what you are going on about. He signed 2 big target men in the past for us, Sir Les and Big Al, and at no point did we play the long ball game.

 

You need diversity in your attack to open up defences, Ashton offers us something different to Martins and Owen. KK values that, his best partnership as a player was when he played for Liverpool with John Toshack (sp?), the big man little man combo worked so well and they won 2 European Cups with it.

 

Bottom line is he's a damn good player, he's proven that in the PL, it's nothing to do with him being English or in the same mould as Shearer, it's to do with his ability and he fills one of our needs.

 

If we're never going to play route one, why is it such a desperate need to have a "strong target man"? As for the 2 big target men he signed for us in the past, both Sir Les and Big Al were so much more than that, they were light years ahead of Ashton. They were great players that also happened to be target men, I'm not so sure that applies to Ashton, he's not what I'd call prolific when it comes to top flight football, unlike those two.

 

Hopefully Keegan realises that football's moved on a bit since the 70s and what worked well then, isn't so good now, big-man/little-man who cares!?! Let's have good-man/good-man, over average-big-man/good-man any day.

 

My bottom line is that I don't think he's that good a player, I don't think he's proven in the Premiership and I think this whole proven in the Premiership thing is bollocks anyway. Yeah, there are different demands playing here than some of the other leagues, but that doesn't mean players from those leagues can't shine here, you just need to have a half decent scouting network and a manager that knows what he's on about to pick them out. Fair enough, we haven't had that in the past, but I reckon we might now, so parochial attitudes about who we should and shouldn't sign, will only hold us back.

 

Then go ahead suggest a better option, that is obtainable by NUFC. Who out there fills our need, or do you think we don't have one? You think Owen and Martins as a paring will work ? I have huge doubts and I don't think for one minute KK has faith in that either. He want's a bigger presence in there.

 

Playing with a big man doesn't mean you have play "70's style football" or route 1 stuff. Labour the point once more please. Arsenal play with a reasonably tall chap up front and are reguarded as perhaps the best footballing side in the land. As someone else pointed out Ashton's game is not just about being the target man, he's good on the deck and goals per game record is pretty decent, just doesn't play enough.

 

I never said he was as good as either Sir Les or Big Al, because he quite clearly isn't but your response was predictable. Sigh. My point, which you chose to ignore was that you can still play pretty "modern" football with a big man or even two in your team.

 

This is not a "oh let's buy him cos he's English" thing, why do you keep bleeting on about that ? 

 

There are numerous better options out there, it's not my job to find them, in fact most of them I haven't got the first clue about at all! That's one of the points I'm making, most of the people offering up Dean Ashton as a good potential signing are only saying that because they know who he is. As a club we need to be casting the net a lot wider than simply the other Premiership sides, it's a lazy and ineffective approach and this is exactly what I'm talking about when I say "parochial attitudes". The best players already in England are out of our reach at the moment, in fact most of the mid-range ones are as well. The ones that are available to us are either no great improvement on what we've already got or worse. They're also really poor value for money. Why is Ashton so much better than Viduka? Even the people who want us to sign him are struggling to come up with an answer to that. My own view is that he isn't better than Viduka, his only advantage is he's younger. I don't see why spending £10m plus on replacing Viduka with someone of a similar or worse level, when hopefully by the time Viduka retires we'll be able to attract someone significantly better, is a good idea. It seems like a pointless waste of money to me.

 

I do think we could do with an additional attacking player, but not a target man. What we really need is a Peter Beardsley type player, someone who can create stuff, but will also chip in with a few goals of their own, someone like Modric (from what I've read) or Arshavin (from what I've seen). Both of those were/are getable in my opinion and if they don't end up here there's others like them out there somewhere, we just need to find them.

 

I'll continue to labour the point about big immobile target-men not being what we need for as long as you continue to labour your point that a big immobile target-man is exactly what we need. I've already said that I disagree with you about Ashton's other abilities being all that good, either accept that's what I think or convince me otherwise, I'm not just going to believe it because you tell me to. As for comparing Adebayor with Ashton, well you're right that they're both quite tall, but that's where the comparison ends I'm afraid. As I've said, this is not about whether a player can be a target man if needed, it's about a player being a target man and nothing else. Adebayor has a lot else to his game, Ashton doesn't, in my view anyway.

 

My point about Ferdinand and Shearer may well have been predictable, but you still seem to have totally missed it. What I'm saying is that Les and Big Al had so much more to their game than simply being a target man, Ashton hasn't. You admit yourself that Ashton simply isn't in their league, yet you continue to use them as examples to back up your argument!! Why isn't he in their league? Because he doesn't have all the other aspects to his game that they did!! This is what makes them legends and him merely an also-ran. You'd be much better comparing him to Duncan Ferguson, as that's a much more appropriate comparison, the only problem is that wouldn't really support your argument for signing him, would it!?!

 

Erm, I'm not bleeting [sic] on about him being English, I've mentioned it once in this conversation. Anyway, I'm bored of this now.

 

indi, that's about the best post i've read on here for a long time in all respects, particularly the beardsley role player...that's been what i've been saying for a long long time

 

owen filled the role quite well at the end of the season but he wasn't producing magic, he was playing a simple game and timing his runs...play the same system but a "creative striker" (note not an attacking midfielder) and we'd be in business

 

who isn't for you or i to say though - we need to be casting the net beyond the english PL & FM08 as you say...surely that's the reason we got this real madrid scout fella?  isn't he supposed to know every player in the world inside out?

[Guest birdhunter]

Ashton  .. you really have to be stupid to spent money to this lad.

[Cronky]

Indi - I'd agree that we need to get a Beardsley-type player who can link midfield and attack, but we should be doing that in addition to getting a target man who's better than Viduka, not instead of.

 

Ashton is quite immobile, but he's one of those rare players who can create time and space for himself simply by his skill on the ball. To say that he's a 'target man and nothing else' is nonsense. He didn't have the greatest game against Trinidad, but there was one moment where the ball came at him, with pace, at about chest height, and, easy as anything, he pulled it down from the air so that it just dropped perfectly to his feet. He does that kind of thing all the time.

[indi]

Isn't that exactly what a target man does though?

[James]

The main asset I see in Ashton, is that pre injury, he is one of the few English players who can get a team by the scruff of the neck and dominate a game, very much like Rooney and Gerrard and pre-2004 Shearer.

 

He hasn't been as good since the injury, but it was a bad injury, and better players have taken over a year to find their old form. In the last couple of months he has shown enough to suggest that there is a fair chance that we could be seeing something near to the 2006 Dean Ashton by next season.

 

He works the flanks well by the way, and his build up play is excellent, which is why he isn't a typical target man.

[Guest shearer_206]

Would love us to sign Ashton. Unfortunately a striker with a history of injury problems is not what we need. We already have Viduka & Ameobi to fill that role.

[Dave]

I like how .com state he's 'significantly fitter' than Viduka.

 

Not really...

[Guest]

I like how .com state he's 'significantly fitter' than Viduka.

 

Not really...

 

Yeah I was thinking that.

 

I wouldn't even say he's that more mobile either...or skilful...or as talented all-round basically.

[SUPERTOON]

Close to signing a new 50k a week deal at West Ham according to this mornings papers

[TRon]

Close to signing a new 50k a week deal at West Ham according to this mornings papers

 

Good. More chance of us going for a more mobile target man then, Crouch and Bent are two that come to mind.

[SUPERTOON]

Close to signing a new 50k a week deal at West Ham according to this mornings papers

 

Good. More chance of us going for a more mobile target man then, Crouch and Bent are two that come to mind.

 

Agreed both would be better and pssibly cheaper options

[Tooj]

I can't see Spurs getting rid of Bent with Defoe going to be off and possibly Berb.

[SUPERTOON]

I can't see Spurs getting rid of Bent with Defoe going to be off and possibly Berb.

 

Think he wants to leave coz he isnt getting a game

[TRon]

I can't see Spurs getting rid of Bent with Defoe going to be off and possibly Berb.

 

They'll be looking to bring other strikers in though. I don't think Ramos was too keen on Bent, though that might have changed.

[KaKa]

Close to signing a new 50k a week deal at West Ham according to this mornings papers

 

Good. More chance of us going for a more mobile target man then, Crouch and Bent are two that come to mind.

 

Crouch more mobile than Ashton?!!!

 

That just rendered your statement null and void.

[TRon]

Close to signing a new 50k a week deal at West Ham according to this mornings papers

 

Good. More chance of us going for a more mobile target man then, Crouch and Bent are two that come to mind.

 

Crouch more mobile than Ashton?!!!

 

That just rendered your statement null and void.

 

Neither of them are quick but Crouch has got a bigger stride so that nicks it for me.

[Guest Heneage]

Crouch better than Ashton?

[BONTEMPI]

Close to signing a new 50k a week deal at West Ham according to this mornings papers

 

Good. More chance of us going for a more mobile target man then, Crouch and Bent are two that come to mind.

 

Crouch more mobile than Ashton?!!!

 

That just rendered your statement null and void.

 

Neither of them are quick but Crouch has got a bigger stride so that nicks it for me.

 

Aye but he can't jump any higher than my bairn.

 

 

If Keegan thinks we only need 3 players to be heading for europe next season then they better be world class!

 

If they're also rans like Crouch, Ashton and Co then I feel we'll be around mid table mark yet again.

 

Only time will tell.