Why are Premier League Strikers Terrible Now? 

recorded this video before Nicolas Jackson went on this recent run, thanks for making me look like a fool Nico x

The sheer madness that would be generated if Darwin Nunez and Timo Werner were in the same team would bring about a force of energy that could heal Nirans horrific knee injury..

Imagine a front three of Nunez, Werner and Lukaku No window within a 15km radius would be safe

Strikers generally have “fallen off” the UCL final is Joselu vs Fullkrug

I think if Niran played striker, he'd not have injured his knee, he would have been Dagenham and Redbridge's all time goal scorer

The problem is that, too many strikers are better suited to being wingers, Jesus, Jackson, Werner, Nunez all have traits of a winger, but for some reason they are strikers

Wenger said That young players dont play in the Park anymore, they are raised in academies that destroy their creativity! Every player is the same no w

it feels like there isn't a striker that leads the attack in the modern game, your attack is led by a "forward" weird how this is only really an issue in the prem

4:33 the man in the mirror joke😂😂😂

Do not forget we still have the goat chris wood best ST in prem history.

This video reminds me of that one fifa video where zlatan, ronaldo, Rooney etc beat a bunch of robots made to play football. I feel like we're going towards that robot era with all the stats and xg cravings instead of treating a game like a game. Elegancy over efficiency yk. I hope if we ever do so, someone invents a time machine and brings prime Ronaldo, zlatan etc to the future to kick them robot butts

Pep changed football in the Prem forever. From STs who are not clinical but can link up plays to GKs who are dead at shot stopping but can ping passes

i don't think that nicolas jackson has actually been that bad tho, like as someone who actually watches him, hes quite good at many things, just occasionally struggles with his shooting

I think the two things that have changed the most in the modern game is the quality of overall team management to shut down big strikers, as well as the quality out on the wings. I feel that more wingers than strikers are talked about nowadays, but I’m not sure if that’s the cause of strikers getting worse stats or an adaptation of it

I think its down more to the profile of the striker position changing over the years. The striker position is no longer a pure goalscorer, but they are now expected to be able to link play together. We're seeing more target players and great off the ball play. They're also being expected to press defensively more than ever. The striker position now is more akin to the CAM position of the past, or even a false 9 at times. Its not that strikers are getting worse, the role of the striker is changing.

The funny thing is, we've got 4 English strikers in the top 10 goalscorers list this season - Cole Palmer - 21, Ollie Watkins - 19, Dominic Solanke - 18, Jarrod Bowen - 16....yet none of them will start for England at the Euros this summer. (To be fair though, Harry Kane has got 44 goals in 45 games this season. It's hardly gonna be a surprise that he'll start every game)

Managers like Pep dont want Strikers they want Midfielders disguised as Strikers, but instead they get Strikers pretending to be Midfielders. Whatever happened to the fox in the box target man that were absolutely killers pounced on chances and scored. Sure its not pretty but it was effective. Its like oh your a striker? Go play winger. Like what?

Interesting perspective, got me thinking!

Football has changed, it makes you wonder what’s the next change in tactics in the future. More wide players and fullbacks are technically gifted than ever.

How have you not hit 1 million subs another top quality video👌

Nunez still having 20+ GA with all of this criticism is crazy

You put some respect on Bald Head Jackson

Football doesn't have as many great players now as they did back then but the overall quality have improved.

13:40 put some respec on Lord Bendtner's name 🤣🤣🤣

In Yaya Toures 13/14 season he didn’t miss a single big chance in the prem and scored 20 Haaland has missed 32 this season and scored 25

I think that people’s perception of what a good striker entails has been affected so much because of Messi and CR7. They have set the bar so high and have dominated at the top for so long and so consistently that it feels like a truly great, top 5 striker should be able to do the same. 20 goals in a season used to be massive for a player but now 20 goals is just okay or even considered underperforming.

Gonna be honest i think the main reason the shift from an out and out 9 to a wide player cutting in/being played down the middle happened in the first place is purely because of Arjen Robben and how well he could just pick up the ball cut inside and smack a shot in with his left and how vulnerable pretty much every team was to him doing this. From their its just spiralled out of control and soon we will see the death of the striker position similar to how a few decades ago we saw the death of the libero/sweeper. The good news is that overtime the position will get reinvented and returned in a slightly altered state (similar to how the libero/sweeper became the CDM and more recently with the revival of a 3 man defence the position effectively returned in everything but name with the central ball playing defender who sits slightly ahead of the other 2 centre backs)

The conclusion to this video was actually quite interesting. Good points made

I think the change from strikers who are only there to score to link up play and more strikers being able to play out wide has something to do with it

As a Newcastle fan I'm absolutely buzzing having Alexander Isak

No good Premier League strikers in the current generation? *Ahem* Erling Haaland? Alexander Isak? Dominik Solanke?

You make a good point on nostalgia. I think overall systems these days don’t really need to play strikers. I mean you can look at the arse. They play saka on the right and martinelli or whoever on the left but havertz through the middle. A man who’s best position is a CAM. They line up with strikers but don’t actually play them at striker they play more of a cam really. They drop deep pick the ball up and play it. Havertz does it really well I got to say. Traditional out and out strikers aren’t needed anymore. Aguero was a perfect example of one as much as it pisses me off to say. You could see his thinking of where to be to maximise his goal scoring. Stats have ruined the game not just on a level of enjoyment but also psychologically for the players. Imagine being Darwin Nunez and seeing how poorly you’ve played consistently. Unless you’ve got thick enough skin to take it and improve (btw players these days have notoriously thin skin) then your confidence is gonna be down the drain. It’s hard to pinpoint exactly where this started and I’m not gonna make a guess. But I do think Harry Kane is one of the first at least I’ve seen that drops deep like this. Overall I think it’s down to stats tbh. People compare players like Trent to Beckham based on stats. Not taking anything away from Trent he’s a phenomenal player but becks was just a better watch. People don’t enjoy the game anymore they want to try and science it up that’s where it’s gone wrong imo that’s why the level of every position has dropped so dramatically

I am a chelsea fan to be honest Jackson has improved his finishing fro the start of the season he is having a decent season but he still need to improve his finishing

Niran would have been a great striker in the PL if it wasn't for that cataclysmic shambolic knee injury he had 😂❤

You know it’s mad when The Box is on par with prem strikers these days 😂

The game this day is more focused on inside forwards that play on the wing so strikers aren’t scoring much as nothing is getting created for them

I play football manager. Even when he was on Benfica back in 2022 his finishing was rated 10/20. lol. His bravery was like 18/20 though. That’s why we love to watch him play but hate to watch him shoot

Bobby Firmino was Jesus + goals for Liverpool. Didn’t get as many as Mané/Salah mind but the guy had a such great skill set for a #9

Thank you for not including Hojlund in the thumbnail, we have had too much suffering this season

The thing with the modern game is that tactics and managers have astronomically improved and so has the defenders tactical understanding and thats why we see strikers like haaland get stopped for the whole game it happened to the number 10 role and has now happened to strikers all around the world

Great vid

I think the use of inside forwards rather than traditional wingers is a big factor. For one, striker are taking comparably less shots and are expected to have a developed all around game including pressing in most modern systems. You have some teams where one of the wide forwards takes more shots per game than the 9 as well.

13:40 Wenger completely threw me off 🤣🤣

depends on what angle your looking at it from. personally think the quality of strikers in the premier league has improved massively over the past 5 or so years, however that coincides with the fact that defending in this league has gotten a lot worse

We’re in our own banter era

Football used to have top of the line strikers. Cantona, Van Basten, Romario, Inzaghi, R9, CR7, Rooney, Ibrahimovic, Aguero, Raul, Suarez and many many more. I swear any of them could get into any team in any era and be one of the best players

0 views in 12 seconds? Fallen off harder than prem strikers

steve lacy the outro, I'm subscribing

a common misconception is Drogba was clinical. he actually wasn't. he just turned up in the big games. frank lampard was the one more clinical than his striker. this is the reason they bought schevchenko, which turned out to be worse than drogba, at least drogba can score crucial goals. bergcamp wasn't either. henry carried arsenals' attack. someone clinical is van nistelrooy, much better than cole and yorke, ronaldo and rooney, the guy was a pure poacher like he just appears unmarked on the box out of nowhere. he's not better than rooney and ronaldo but he always scored.

They used to be ‘terrible’ (if you want to use that word). But there was no RU-vid or Twitter to make their open miss clips go viral. Their ‘low’ (by today's standards) career goal stats speak for themselves.

Please make a video on players being overplayed every season and getting little rest off-season

Most teams don’t play with an old school number 9 any more. Haaland is an exception, but Man City sometimes use a false 9 too.

Giroud, Lacazette were both horribly frustating. Walcott got 20 goals in a season before them. Lacazette was never elite for Arsenal and we had to buy Aubameyang soon after to save us, and Giroud couldn’t finish and would go weeks without scoring

Jackson is the main source of my depression 😭 Timo Werner used to do the same... God, I've been through alot 😂😂

Dawin Nunez gonna have my boys trim pulling back😅😅

Wayne Gretzky famously said “you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take” but I think if he was talking about premier league strikers he’d have said “you miss 100% of the shots you do take”

I don't think its a prem issue. There a genuine shortage of proper goalscorers. It doesn't help that modern strikers essentially have to be good midfielders too. 10 years ago people wouldn't have criticised halaand for playing the way he does, but now people do. Targets have changed and so have the players. Its the same thing with wingers, it is so difficult to find good dribblers who are also good creators nowadays

Mad take but I think the same with goalkeepers. Yes Alisson and Ederson are solid but feel somewhat less than Van Der Sar, Cech, Lehman and Reina.

Mateta & Munioz being a top strikers in the prem this year is crazy

This man is better than Nunez even with his knee injury😅😂

9:36 getting exposed by your own stats is crazy

0:46 but that was a Phil jones clip😅😅😅

I'm surprised more premier league teams don't go strikerless to solve this issue!

I know it was back in the 90s but Robbie Fowler in his prime was unstoppable!

Christian Benteke 🤌🏾🔥 the ultimate streets wont forget striker ⚽️ with that celebration I am sure we all remember 😅

Strikers aren't goalscorers anyore and wingers are. Also, we have a LOT more goals scored in recent seasons compared to 10+ year ago.

Strikers have lost identity over-time especially with the game's focus shifting from individual play to tactical play. Most top club strikers nowadays play as a support to draw opposition players into them to create space, primarily on the wings.

It because they have no support. Back then they played 442. They had another forward to help split the backs. Now the center forward is used to simply hold the ball, distract the center backs, and then pass it to the trailer midfielder, or winger who is the primary goal scorer. If someone played 2 center fowards today they would be unstoppable cause backs are lazy today and are small, and are more concerned with getting forward and being a part of the offense cause they had nothing to defend.

I grew up watching Rooney at United who could literally do everything. Now I'm stuck with Wout Weghorst and while Rasmus isn't bad he ain't a Rooney or a Berbatov, or a RVP and is probably closer stylistically to that of Lakaka even though he seems to has half his bodyweight

Probably because the game is more skilled than it was before, meaning a winger is just as capable of scoring than the striker

i will be fair to nicolas jackson he was a winger at villereal but last season for some reason they started putting him at st

Here before the knee injury jokes

Richarlison is kinda good now, and he didn’t miss tap ins, he just didn’t score

Apart from that ROBOT who have 42 gaol contributions so far, the rest of strikers havc been absolute shambolic 😒🤨 .

tbf man united had like cavani, Ronaldo, Rashford, Martial & Greenwood at same time...

The good strikers are just not on the top 6. The quality is higher than it seems as a result

Imagine Heskey in the modern era scrutiny

Richarlison has been class, he’s over performed his xG this season

Streets wont forget Kiki Musampa and Paul Dickov

11:50 Agüero, Super Mario, Robinho and one or two world class players

While the quality of strikers is lower, i mostly blame the change in football philosophy. Since spain won trophies without a striker, the football world in general changed how they think about football and traditional GK and ST lost the most from it

As a palace fan, cant relate with Mateta’s current form

11:51 the disrespect to aguero is crazy

Don’t think the strikers are necessary that much worse now then before. I Think people think that purely because of nostalgia and use of social media now of days. I mean now everyone overreacts if their team ain’t dominating the first minute of a match. Back then there was no social media, I can promise you there would be Twitter (X) discourse about Drogba goalscorings record constantly happening on social media if it was popular as it is today.

Problem is that defenders have just gotta that so much more better.

0:45 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Aguero is the best striker in premier league EVER Change my mind

Thumbnail isnt fair. Haland could stand in with the "2000s-early 10s" generation on his current trajectory. Cole Palmer, Alexander Isak and Ollie Watkins had good seasons too.

What's crazy is that 10 years ago Lukaku used to be one of the good strikers in the Premier League

and then there's Rasmus Holjund, man united love charity work but wont feed their striker😂😭😭

Football sure is weird nowadays. You got players who are average at the skill that should matter the most for their position (shot stopping for goalies, defending for defenders, and finishing for strikers), being considered as very good players, since they can “pass the ball nicely.”

Young Dzeko would be golden boot in any first half of the table team this season

City had Aguero, Tevez, Dzeko, Balotelli was decent for us

I'm still waiting on a miracle ti COOOOOOOOOOMEEEE

I would say someone like Darwin is more of a true winger

Are you telling me the only league where every game between top-7 teams ends up with a 4-3 score, has no strikers? Wow they have even fewer defenders then

Someone hasn’t heard of Jean phillipe mateta

You forgot to add your beautiful face at the left side of the thumbnail mate...

I think that’s a little unfair to Werner. We actually didn’t bring him in to score goals

We’re just in that era with a lot of average strikers. Sad.