Darwin Núñez

[Pablo]

Thing is, given we paid £75m for him and he's on £140k per week; what the absolute **** are we to do if the manager decides he's not good enough? Sell for buttons? Keep as a violently overpriced supersub?

I think we need to keep things in context here. He has 18 goals and 13 assists this season. He's not ****! He's still worth a very good fee to someone. He's just probably not quite good enough for us and what we need.

[spud_gun]

Thing is, given we paid £75m for him and he's on £140k per week; what the absolute **** are we to do if the manager decides he's not good enough? Sell for buttons? Keep as a violently overpriced supersub?

Loan him to an Italian club next season with no option to buy

It's written in the stars

[Doc_Piptorious]

You are comparing actuals with the "chances to" though... not like for like.

If they had the same chances they would be more likely to score... and I appreciate they may not get into those positions.

Problem is we cant support him and Diaz and Salah '24, on top of an injured Jota and Gakpo (who I still rate). If he was one of 5 options, then fine. He has his uses. But right now he seems to have no uses, and his primary one: scoring goals, he is very bad at. We are srill creating more chances that almost any other team, but we have no reliability. It coukd be tiredness, afterall we have been here before. But Nunez has not been playing every game and should be in his prime. Atchis best he is a beast, but how often is that. Trotting it out in Europa games against ****e does not cut it for me.

Yes I am looking at actual returns and not the hypothetical ones.


And in terms of actual returns if Nunez is not the answer, and he may well not be, then non of the other under 30 senior attackers look to be the answer either.


Does not really matter how many goals or assists they might get if they could stay fit or if they got themselves on the end of more chances, the simple face is that they are not doing so.



Jota is a great finisher? Yes he probably is but he is not fit for enough games a season for us to get the advantage of that.

Gakpo is a really clever player but don't think he is a natural finisher or a natural at "seeing" where a chance may be about to occur.


Diaz I think is very overrated. Looks full of life in some games then vanishes for others. Gets some goals and gets a low number of assists over a season.

[spud_gun]

I think we need to keep things in context here. He has 18 goals and 13 assists this season. He's not ****! He's still worth a very good fee to someone. He's just probably not quite good enough for us and what we need.

Across 50 games in 4 competitions. It's not a great return.

[Rich]

Thing is, given we paid £75m for him and he's on £140k per week; what the absolute **** are we to do if the manager decides he's not good enough? Sell for buttons? Keep as a violently overpriced supersub?

I reckon we could get £40m for him. I know part exchange is very rare now but not impossible.

He's a player than a team/manager might take a gamble on because IF he can revert/turn into something he's a 30 goal a season player. Huge gamble and highly unrealistic. But footy is a strange game.

[Buzzo]

He'd tear it up for the likes of PSG.

[Exiled_red]

Across 50 games in 4 competitions. It's not a great return.

To be honest it's not a terrible return either.

Peak Mane was getting between 16 and 26 goals from similar number of games for us (but in all likelihood more minutes) not sure on his assist stats though. Clearly not as good as Mane's numbers but I don't think they are *that* bad when looked at in isolation.

The problem is that he should probably be on at least 25 goals

[Fierce]

I think we need to keep things in context here. He has 18 goals and 13 assists this season. He's not ****! He's still worth a very good fee to someone. He's just probably not quite good enough for us and what we need.

Salient point

I suppose Salah is a similar proposition. My eyes tell me he's on a steep decline, but stats don't necessarily agree

[Fierce]

I think with Nunez, and this is absolutely not his fault, if he wasn't bought for such an astronomical figure his failings wouldn't be so widely discussed

[DerKrampus]

Thing is, given we paid £75m for him and he's on £140k per week; what the absolute **** are we to do if the manager decides he's not good enough? Sell for buttons? Keep as a violently overpriced supersub?

Nah, I think we'd recoup a decent fee (insert link to fee amortising) and his wages aren't ridiculous so he's still affordable to a large number of teams across Europe.

[Exiled_red]

Salient point

I suppose Salah is a similar proposition. My eyes tell me he's on a steep decline, but stats don't necessarily agree

I suspect that Nunez stats are roughly consistent between the first half and the second half of the season, I suspect in Salah's case there is a massive difference.

Not saying Salah is or isn't done but since the ACN/injury the drop off for Salah has been huge, whether the injury is a mitigating circumstance and with a preseason he will get back to where he was who knows...

[Craig_H]

I think we need to keep things in context here. He has 18 goals and 13 assists this season. He's not ****! He's still worth a very good fee to someone. He's just probably not quite good enough for us and what we need.

Those numbers are relative though. A quality striker/finisher given the same sort of chances could be getting 30 goals and 20 assists, perhaps. And that’s what can make the difference between winning the title and not. At this level, you can’t afford Nunez’s miss-rate.

[peterbread]

One of the biggest problems with him is that when he does get a good chance, most of us (if we’re being honest) don’t believe he’s going to score. It’s almost an unexpected bonus if he does. That says it all.

Compare it to Jota who when he was through against Fulham how many of you were ready to celebrate because you knew he would score.

[Pablo]

Those numbers are relative though. A quality striker/finisher given the same sort of chances could be getting 30 goals and 20 assists, perhaps. And that’s what can make the difference between winning the title and not. At this level, you can’t afford Nunez’s miss-rate.

Oh yeah I agree 100%.

My point really is he's not some lost asset. He is still a very good striker. Those numbers are still really good, even if he should have scored more. he is 10th in the Premier League for goals and assists. The one only above him are very good players.

Someone would want him and he will fetch a decent fee. That's all I was saying really.

[Irishnev]

My mate made that same comparison last night. It is, unfortunately, somewhat valid. Just a shame Nunez didn’t cost £14m.

That 14m was v big money back then and arguably comparable to what we paid for Nunez due to football inflation