Mario Mandzukic

[petre.ispirescu 4,928]

A striker is the last thing United would want.

Daily Mail at its best. Again...

[Magic Lamps 11,456]

From what I know, BILD used to be reliable but they've gone down hill in recent years.

Bild is and has ever been about the opposite of reliable. It's like the Dailfail or the Sun. The bild only consists of fear, hatred, boobs and the weather forecast like a German band once put it. It is a paper for the dumb and poor. The bild is not good enough to wipe your ass with it. They publish so many rumours, they have to get one right every once in a while.

[CHOULO19 24,332]

Bild is and has ever been about the opposite of reliable. It's like the Dailfail or the Sun. The bild only consists of fear, hatred, boobs and the weather forecast like a German band once put it. It is a paper for the dumb and poor. The bild is not good enough to wipe your ass with it. They publish so many rumours, they have to get one right every once in a while.

Boobs are nice...

[Nike 373]

Bild is and has ever been about the opposite of reliable. It's like the Dailfail or the Sun. The bild only consists of fear, hatred, boobs and the weather forecast like a German band once put it. It is a paper for the dumb and poor. The bild is not good enough to wipe your ass with it. They publish so many rumours, they have to get one right every once in a while.

Bild called Gotze first last season....

And Pep to Munich.

[Magic Lamps 11,456]

Bild called Gotze first last season....

And Pep to Munich.

as i said, they tend to get one right every one in a while, just because they publish so much bullshit.

As they are always sucking BAyern's incest-crippled balls, they get some information earlier than other papers, but only because most german papers are slow as fuck. Over here it does not count if you break a news a day earlier or later (just as our public TV has 4 times as much budget as BBC or CNN but still gets international news days later) but how well it is reported.

Anyway some of my mates predicted Pep and Götze months before Bild, I would still not believe everything they say. I might repeat myself, but Bild is a parody of a paper and even more pathetic than the sun. Even the above mentioned boos as well as their owners pictured are low quality.

Back to the Mandzukic rumours:

Bild reporting means fuck all. How many of us have thought about Mandzukic being an option for us and BAyern's Interest in Luiz. As soon as Mandzukic was leaving, Bild, just like us, put 1 and 1 together.

However, Juve might habe better chances of getting him, cos he will be more of a first choice there, playing next to Tevez. Mandzukic is 28, good age for a striker, but could be too late to get used to a league which is a level above and a team which is not exactly suited for a striker like him. Juve on the other side have marauding wing-backs who like to pump in crosses and the lower pace of that league also makes adjustment for players from Germany easier as recent instances have shown.

I

[Rmpr 8,977]

We're a counter-attacking team. Costa will lead that.

If teams sit deep then we tend to pump more crosses into the box - Mandzukic is an excellent aerial threat.

Lukaku really isn't necessary next season if we have both these players offering these options. So from a tactical sense it does make perfect sense, although I'd love to see you try and argue that it doesn't.

LOL, what a ridiculously poor argument!

it is pretty simple...Mandzukic isnt needed if we already have Costa and Lukaku. In fact, him and Costa would be a worse duo than Costa and Lukaku.

It is way better to have Costa leading the line and Romelu as the second option. Firstly, Diego will take most of the pressure away from the Belgian, which can positively reflect in his performances. Secondly, we know Lukaku likes Chelsea, respects Mourinho and would probably not have a problem with being second choice (something Mandzukic clearly isnt). Thirdly, Romelu knows the Premier League (arent you so ridiculously fixated on that? LOL). Lastly, Lukaku is a lot younger and has room to improve and reach a level the Croatian never will.

The only skill Mandzukic excells at is in the heading department, but our team isnt even great at crossing the ball from open play that it pretty much all goes to waist. We cant have a second option who isnt at his best playing in our style!

Mandzukic is an average player who thrived on a perfectly balanced team. He is not worth cutting Luiz' price in half. Not now, not never!

You dont build a team with two strikers with the absolute same characteristics. You just dont (maybe you dont know that from playing FIFA). The best is to have two great options who CAN play well in the same system, but still maintain a few differences if a time comes when you need to change the team a bit. Specially when Jose puts both strikers on the pitch!

Also, I find it weird how you cried like a pathetic little baby when Lukaku was loaned to Everton and now wishes Mandzukic becomes our second option ahead of him...

[The only place to be 11,313]

LOL, what a ridiculously poor argument!

it is pretty simple...Mandzukic isnt needed if we already have Costa and Lukaku. In fact, him and Costa would be a worse duo than Costa and Lukaku.

It is way better to have Costa leading the line and Romelu as the second option. Firstly, Diego will take most of the pressure away from the Belgian, which can positively reflect in his performances. Secondly, we know Lukaku likes Chelsea, respects Mourinho and would probably not have a problem with being second choice (something Mandzukic clearly isnt). Thirdly, Romelu knows the Premier League (arent you so ridiculously fixated on that? LOL). Lastly, Lukaku is a lot younger and has room to improve and reach a level the Croatian never will.

The only skill Mandzukic excells at is in the heading department, but our team isnt even great at crossing the ball from open play that it pretty much all goes to waist. We cant have a second option who isnt at his best playing in our style!

Mandzukic is an average player who thrived on a perfectly balanced team. He is not worth cutting Luiz' price in half. Not now, not never!

You dont build a team with two strikers with the absolute same characteristics. You just dont (maybe you dont know that from playing FIFA). The best is to have two great options who CAN play well in the same system, but still maintain a few differences if a time comes when you need to change the team a bit. Specially when Jose puts both strikers on the pitch!

Also, I find it weird how you cried like a pathetic little baby when Lukaku was loaned to Everton and now wishes Mandzukic becomes our second option ahead of him...

So very little actually posted about the tactical aspect.

The problem with our crossing has been a lack of decent targets. It was EXACTLY the same when Azpi and Cole were in their natural positions last season. Mandzukic off the bench against teams who defend deep would provide an excellent aerial target for our crosses, something that Lukaku simply doesn't despite his size. He would actually change our gameplan with his introduction more radically than would be the case with Lukaku whose strengths are very similar to Costa's.

I have no doubt Lukaku could score a few goals for us, but in terms of tactical versatility I much prefer the options that a combination of Costa and Mandzukic bring whilst farming Lukaku out for another 1-2 seasons to improve his all round game before returning here at the age of 23 to take over from Mandzukic and hopefully provide more than he currently seems to week-in and week-out.

As for my reaction to Lukaku leaving, it was based on the fact that our remaining strikers simply weren't good enough and didn't offer enough to this club. We missed him last season but if we had Costa and Mandzukic going into the new year, I really don't think that would be the case. This is one of those tricky little situations where context applies so I understand some of your confusion....I really do.

So let's just agree to disagree ok and wish each other the best.

Edited May 21, 2014 by Rmpr
Content moderated due to offensive language.

[Jype 6,398]

LOL, what a ridiculously poor argument!

it is pretty simple...Mandzukic isnt needed if we already have Costa and Lukaku. In fact, him and Costa would be a worse duo than Costa and Lukaku.

It is way better to have Costa leading the line and Romelu as the second option. Firstly, Diego will take most of the pressure away from the Belgian, which can positively reflect in his performances. Secondly, we know Lukaku likes Chelsea, respects Mourinho and would probably not have a problem with being second choice (something Mandzukic clearly isnt). Thirdly, Romelu knows the Premier League (arent you so ridiculously fixated on that? LOL). Lastly, Lukaku is a lot younger and has room to improve and reach a level the Croatian never will.

The only skill Mandzukic excells at is in the heading department, but our team isnt even great at crossing the ball from open play that it pretty much all goes to waist. We cant have a second option who isnt at his best playing in our style!

Mandzukic is an average player who thrived on a perfectly balanced team. He is not worth cutting Luiz' price in half. Not now, not never!

You dont build a team with two strikers with the absolute same characteristics. You just dont (maybe you dont know that from playing FIFA). The best is to have two great options who CAN play well in the same system, but still maintain a few differences if a time comes when you need to change the team a bit. Specially when Jose puts both strikers on the pitch!

I agree to the extent of Lukaku having much more room for improvement and being more familiar with the PL. Also, after three seasons in England between 18 and 21 he will qualify as homegrown sometime in August which in our case can never be underestimated due to our lack of homegrown talent.

For the short-term having Mandzukic would be a better fit for us, of that I have no doubt. He's a proven +20 goal a season striker with a lot more experience of winning and also a completely different type of player to Costa so tactically he would offer more versatility than Lukaku would. Not going to call him world class because that word is overused these days, but for now he is definitely a better player than Lukaku. However, this kind of shortsighted thinking has been a big part of the problem with the club until the last couple of years when the transfer policy finally started being more sensible. Would it really be worth getting a player like Mandzukic for 3-4 years at most if it meant saying goodbye to Lukaku who could easily offer us over 10 years?

Personally I would love nothing more than to see Lukaku be a success at the club but that doesn't entirely depend on what Mourinho / the board decide. If Lukaku wants to leave for a team where he will be the top dog or if his relationship with Mourinho has suffered because of whatever happened last summer, I would understand if we sold him and in that case getting someone like Mandzukic to replace him would be the best possible option. Whatever happens, I will leave this one to the hands of those who have more information about the situation than me and won't complain with the outcome. I rate Mandzukic highly and the blow of losing Lukaku would be significantly easier to take if we already had a great player lined up to replace him with.

[nadavTKL 1,787]

So according to Di Marzio, we dont want Mario:

'Bayern Munich was strongly interested too: they were ready to offer Mandzukic plush cash. However, Chelsea has basically already closed the deal for Diego Costa, so they rejected Bayern’s proposal."

(from his article about Luiz-PSG)

[BenIsLegend 475]

@AlexHoliga Mandžukić confirms he's leaving Bayern, says he informed the club of his desire to leave. http://sportske.jutarnji.hr/mandzukic-konacno-otkrio--ne-odgovara-mi-guardiolin-nogomet-i-zato-idem-iz-bayerna-/1197686/ …

[Miki-Liki 405]

@AlexHoliga Mandžukić confirms he's leaving Bayern, says he informed the club of his desire to leave. http://sportske.jutarnji.hr/mandzukic-konacno-otkrio--ne-odgovara-mi-guardiolin-nogomet-i-zato-idem-iz-bayerna-/1197686/ …

He said that Guardiola's style didn't suit him and that he felt he couldn't give his best.

Personally, I'm against signing him, I'd rather we kept Ba.

[Waterfall 893]

If we sell Lukaku and buy Mandzukic, I wouldn't be against making Bamford our 3rd striker.

[BenIsLegend 475]

Honestly and realistically the best result we can get from this transfer window in terms of strikers is signing Costa, Mandzukic and retaining Lukaku whilst shipping the rest.

But I doubt Torres is going to leave so if Mandzukic was to come I'd worry it would be Lukaku to be axed.

[DanishBlue 426]

I really want this guy. He cant be that expensive now that everyone knows that he is for sale and that he wants to leave. Signing Costa and Mandzukic would be amazing.

[bababoom 4,478]

Costa, Mandzukic and Lukaku is a bit overkill, how are we going to keep the 3rd striker happy? Costa, Lukaku (if he wants to fight for his place) and Torres/Ba, is more realistic.

[BenIsLegend 475]

Costa, Mandzukic and Lukaku is a bit overkill, how are we going to keep the 3rd striker happy? Costa, Lukaku (if he wants to fight for his place) and Torres/Ba, is more realistic.

City manage it somehow, considering the amount of games we play on average a season I'm sure its possible.

[DanishBlue 426]

But dont they play with 2 strikers most of the time? That makes the difference I guess.

[ChelseaFanUK 1,014]

Was heavily linked wasnt he. Interest probably cooled now with Costa imminent