Nicolas Jackson

[Displayname]

14 minutes ago, geordie_b said:

In hindsight it was a reasonable fee, £28m rising to £35m was very high for what he was at the time.

Was it? Didn't really get the impression that it was at the time. Not saying he came cheap, but he was one of the most promising young english players.

[geordie_b]

17 minutes ago, Displayname said:

Was it? Didn't really get the impression that it was at the time. Not saying he came cheap, but he was one of the most promising young english players.

At the time he had played less than 1000 senior minutes for Chelsea, he was a talent but we were paying for potential

[The College Dropout]

Yep we paid a premium for potential.

 

£30m for a teenage fullback with 9 league games (in any pro league) under his belt is a lot of money.

 

IMO we should continue with that type of deal. Pay a little more money for what we consider top talents in the 18-22 bracket. It requires patience from the board though.

 

I think getting Hall rather than Robinson (who we were linked with and is a Howe style player) cost us a European place that season. Robinson replacing Burn at FB would've got us an extra 3 points imo. But in the medium-long term we have a better player.

 

In the main - the bigger clubs have shown a reluctance to gamble in that market. And some of the riskier foreign signings. Your Watford JP's or Sarr's, Etikite after flopping at PSG, Kudus at Ajax, Paqueta at Lyon etc.

[sturla]

I was on board with Nicolas Jackson until I saw that he is underperforming his XG by 0,25, that is massive.

He has the same shot on target per 90 as Isak with a much lower XG90 and even lower G90.

 

 

This look really grim and to pay 70m for that is criminal I think.

[wyn davies]

Asi stated this morning,  he's crap.

[Dokko]

Rather just play Osula. Reckon he'd hit double figures in the league with the majority of starts. I'd only see a few more than that from Jackson. 

[Mike]

6 hours ago, Zero said:

I still don’t understand why don’t just go and find the next Jackson.

 

Now that the crumpled list has presumably disintegrated and all the names on the old Graham Carr list have retired, we can only sign top 6 detritus. We're definitely not the money laundering arm of a major investment firm though. We're not even sportswashing, ffs.

 

 I genuinely worry what we're going to be when Eddie leaves.

[Guest]

Not good enough for a team we seek to be better than

[KaKa]

2 minutes ago, sturla said:

I was on board with Nicolas Jackson until I saw that he is underperforming his XG by 0,25, that is massive.

He has the same shot on target per 90 as Isak with a much lower XG90 and even lower G90.

 

 

This look really grim and to pay 70m for that is criminal I think.

 

So you look at those two charts and how closely Jackson mirrors Isak's chart everywhere except finishing, and it put you off? Interesting.

 

Meanwhile Ekitike underperformed his xg to a greater degree than Jackson, while playing in the Bundesliga, and this was never raised as an issue when we were looking at him.

[Erikse]

They bought JP for 55m and clearly rather want him in their team than Jackson. Yet they want much more for Jackson..

[Kanj]

2 minutes ago, KaKa said:

 

So you look at those two charts and how closely Jackson mirrors Isak's chart everywhere except finishing, and it put you off? Interesting.

 

Meanwhile Ekitike underperformed his xg to a greater degree than Jackson, while playing in the Bundesliga, and this was never raised as an issue when we were looking at him.

whole forum wanted to puke when JP was linked with his 4 goals in open play 

[tgarve]

4 minutes ago, Dokko said:

Rather just play Osula. Reckon he'd hit double figures in the league with the majority of starts. I'd only see a few more than that from Jackson. 

Honestly this is a terrible take. Osula is miles behind Jackson man

[Smal]

9 minutes ago, sturla said:

I was on board with Nicolas Jackson until I saw that he is underperforming his XG by 0,25, that is massive.

He has the same shot on target per 90 as Isak with a much lower XG90 and even lower G90.

 

 

This look really grim and to pay 70m for that is criminal I think.

0.54 - 0.39 = 0.15, fwiw

[r0cafella]

3 minutes ago, KaKa said:

 

So you look at those two charts and how closely Jackson mirrors Isak's chart everywhere except finishing, and it put you off? Interesting.

 

Meanwhile Ekitike underperformed his xg to a greater degree than Jackson, while playing in the Bundesliga, and this was never raised as an issue when we were looking at him.

He's worst in every metric and Isak took 2 months off after the cup final man. 

 

You don't want your striker massively underperforming xg especially if he's your main guy. 

[Mike]

3 minutes ago, Erikse said:

They bought JP for 55m and clearly rather want him in their team than Jackson. Yet they want much more for Jackson..

 

And they'll get it, and use that to sign 15 other players for 80m each. Then they'll sell the mailboxes in the office lobby to the womens team for 500m.

[Erikse]

1 minute ago, Mike said:

 

And they'll get it, and use that to sign 15 other players for 80m each. Then they'll sell the mailboxes in the office lobby to the womens team for 500m.

 

To themselves, because they want to keep the mailboxes.

[Jeremiah Dixon]

1 minute ago, Erikse said:

 

To themselves, because they want to keep the mailboxes.

And then they'll send them out on loan for a really high monthly fee

 

 

Edited August 7, 2025 by Jeremiah Dixon

[Shearergol]

4 minutes ago, tgarve said:

Honestly this is a terrible take. Osula is miles behind Jackson man

Osula is shite but people are desperate to love him. Seems like a nice lad though.

[Mike]

1 minute ago, Jeremiah Dixon said:

And then they'll send them out on loan for a really high monthly fee

 

 

 

 

Dick Master won't even get a notification on his phone, either. It'll just be popups about how we put cheese on our whoppers and the amortization ramifications of that decadence.

[Erikse]

It's difficult to compare those stats like that. Isak was our main man. Most of our attacking play revolved around him. Chelsea had lots of high quality attackers. Their total xG was higher than ours, but Jacksons xG was noticeably lower than Isaks.

 

 

Edited August 7, 2025 by Erikse

[ponsaelius]

The optics of spending big money on him are just atrocious. We will effectively be paying for the two players they signed ahead of us, by buying the one they don't want anymore.

 

There has got to be a similar signing to Jackson out there that we can recruit from Europe for half the price. Our approach to the market this summer, whatever the reason for it, is utterly maddening.

[The College Dropout]

Underperforming Xg isn't the worst thing if the overall Xg is strong and the player is young. With experience and composure, you would hope their conversion improves.

A high Xg is always positive to me, even if the conversion isn't great. Jackson is at a point you think it's now or never to get it right.

 

For me with Jackson, it's primarily composure than technical. But then they become one in the same. One of Isak's gifts is he's composed. He orients his body as such that he finishes on balance and tremendously cleanly. Henry talks about slowing down mentally and having automatic finishes, Isak often has that. Jackson doesn't, you can see his heart race increasing before he shoots. Off balance, rushed, timing is off. The rest of his game isn't like that so it's definitely mental. Which is probably a better barrier than a technical one but not worth £51m+ imo.

 

I still like him. And we'll always sign strikers with significant risks or limitations. A certified bagsman and baller, mid 20's or younger is a £100m+ player. A baller that might become a bagsman is £80m+. Game is fucked.

[The College Dropout]

We only got Isak because he had a 12-month stinker. We'll have to take a risk in some capacity.

[Smal]

Jackson would be a good signing if it was £50m and a rotational option. 

[McCormick]

8 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

Underperforming Xg isn't the worst thing if the overall Xg is strong and the player is young. With experience and composure, you would hope their conversion improves.

A high Xg is always positive to me, even if the conversion isn't great. Jackson is at a point you think it's now or never to get it right.

 

For me with Jackson, it's primarily composure than technical. But then they become one in the same. One of Isak's gifts is he's composed. He orients his body as such that he finishes on balance and tremendously cleanly. Henry talks about slowing down mentally and having automatic finishes, Isak often has that. Jackson doesn't, you can see his heart race increasing before he shoots. Off balance, rushed, timing is off. The rest of his game isn't like that so it's definitely mental. Which is probably a better barrier than a technical one but not worth £51m+ imo.

 

I still like him. And we'll always sign strikers with significant risks or limitations. A certified bagsman and baller, mid 20's or younger is a £100m+ player. A baller that might become a bagsman is £80m+. Game is fucked.

I agree with most of this, but from what I’ve seen, he rarely strikes the ball cleanly. That’s not something you can effectively coach at this level; you’d just have to accept it, like we do with Gordon or Bruno, and hope he offers enough in other areas to make up for that flaw.

 

It doesn’t help, like you said, that he’s very panicky in front of goal too.

 

 

Edited August 7, 2025 by McCormick