Manchester United centre-forward Rasmus Hojlund carries the same attacking threat as his notoriously goal-shy former team-mate Aaron Wan-Bissaka, shocking analysis has revealed.
The Athletic conducted a deep dive into the trials and tribulations of the soon-to-be-22-year-old, who has failed to register a single shot – either on or off target – in seven of his 13 Premier League starts this season.
It is a dismal, but not entirely unexpected, figure, particularly with last night’s horror show still fresh in the memory.
United ground out an uninspiring but essential victory at Craven Cottage, a deflected Lisandro Martinez strike proving the difference in a 1-0 win over Fulham.
The Argentinian centre-back – yes, centre-back – has managed two goals in United’s last four league matches despite sitting the entire Brighton and Hove Albion game out.
In the same period Hojlund has mustered just one shot, an off-target effort against Liverpool.
It has to be said that the Danish international has a desperately unenviable task, the inexperienced spearhead of a United side at times allergic to creating chances for a traditional centre-forward.
The Athletic refence a moment against Fulham when Noussair Mazraoui opted to chip a cross to Diogo Dalot rather than cut the ball back for Hojlund. And their analysis is harsh but fair, noting that the striker “was not giving off the vibe of a player convinced he would bring a threat.”
A lack of self-belief seems to be entrenched in the youngster’s play at the moment, and it’s no secret that he is a confidence player. It took months for him to grow into himself at Old Trafford after arriving for a huge £72m, but this time last year he was in the midst of the purplest of patches, netting seven goals in six Premier League matches.
Now he looks a lonely, downbeat figure, forever backing into defenders in needless physical battles to hold the ball up, while it bounces hopelessly off him – his hold-up play is currently nowhere near good enough.
Bluntly, in his current state it’s not the role for him. The Athletic note that he is at his best “running onto forward passes in the channels”, and that when he got this chance against Fulham it proved fruitful. This was one of the most exciting aspects of his play last season, using his turn of pace to leave defenders for dust.
But for the United of the present, a Frankenstein’s monster of a side in an ugly transition towards Ruben Amorim’s 3-4-3 style of football, their centre-forward needs to offer more, and alternative option Joshua Zirkzee is not convincing in the role either.
Hojlund is a stark contrast to the last number 9 Amorim worked with before swapping Lisbon for Manchester; Viktor Gyokeres has 34 goals in 33 matches in all competitions so far this season. Or is the contrast as stark as all that? As The Athletic note, when the Swede was Hojlund’s age he had a loan at Swansea City where he failed to score in 11 Championship appearances.
And so we arrive at the crux of the issue, that the ask of Hojlund is wildly unrealistic given his lack of experience, and of the God-given natural talent which allowed players like Harry Kane and Erling Haaland to take the world by storm in their early 20s.
Speaking of his Danish centre-forward, Amorim said: “He wants really, really hard. Then you can see that sometimes without training there is a disconnection. Without training, sometimes he goes away when he should be near, sometimes goes near when he should make a run.”
Amorim has previously been firm that he doesn’t want to use the lack of training time as an excuse, but as an explanation it stands up.
“We don’t have time to create that connection. We don’t train these kind of things. We just talk about these things and he has a lot to improve, like the team-mates. Sometimes you have a good game and other days you can have a not good performance.”
His miserable night in west London falls squarely into the latter category, and brings us full circle to the cold hard numbers behind his current form. Hojlund has only had 33 touches in opposition boxes all season in the league – team-mate Amad is on 113 and counting, and Liverpool’s apex attacker Mo Salah has managed 248.
Somehow his lack of shots is even more depressing, with The Athletic laying bare the fact that his 12 shots is the same as out-and-out defenders Wan-Bissaka, Nathan Collins and Konstantinos Mavropanos. Again for some context, Haaland has taken 91 and Bruno Fernandes is United’s leading shot-taker with 62.
The best thing for United’s young number 9 would be the arrival of an established striker to take the heat off, a more senior figure for him to learn from and shelter behind.
Whether INEOS will deliver such a player in January or in the summer is anyone’s guess, but should they do a Hojlund and fail to get a shot away the Dane will have no choice but to knuckle down and shoulder the burden. He’s shown what he can do, he just needs to do everything he can to get back there, and the great hope is that the team around him will click into a gear which he can use to drive forward.
Featured image Richard Heathcote via Getty Images
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Joe Ponting
Joe has spent more than half his life writing about football and all of it following United. As a child he told a doctor his name was ‘Paul Scholes’, but could never pick a pass like him no matter how much he tried.
