Why Rooney and Giroud are firing blanks

The common top four suspects in English Premier League, save for Manchester City, have failed to score more that a single goal — Arsenal, in fact, relied on a Crystal Palace own goal to win.

Clearly the so-called ‘cream of the crop’ have no cream at all, leave alone a basic milk flow of goals. It cannot be that the lower half of the league have built strong defensive forces, but as witnessed the other weekend, it must be a story of wasted chances by average looking strikers.

So, what is Man City doing right that others aren’t? Well for sure it’s not a simple story of superior strikers but rather a system that’s more offensive.

Their midfield plays a high line, close to the attacking line of strikers, and even Yaya Toure has moved from his reserved supportive role to an offensive position. Simply put, the Man City system can actually survive without a superior out and out striker. So comfortable are they upfront that they are instead buying a centre back, in the name of Nicolas Otamendi. Though I still believe, come the back end of the season; not having a support striker to Aguero, could come back to bite them harder than a Suarez.

Meanwhile, Arsenal fans might be slowly beginning to realise that we have several local politicians with more children than the goals Giroud will score this season. The person who needs to realise this fast though is Mr Wenger. It seems he has, with this week’s 48-million pound offer tabled for Karim Benzema, but his move looks uncertain. A figure that’s a bank breaker beyond their usual, it’s obvious that there is appreciation that Arsenal’s problem lies upfront.

Manchester United on the other hand pulled a couple of goals from Memphis Depay, which has clearly developed some sense of complacency in pursuit of a striking king. A weak pursuit of Pedro, led him to gladly race for the more obvious winning choice of Chelsea with Mourinho as coach. Who are we thinking of settling for instead? The 23-year-old Sadio Mane from Southampton.

 What happened to our hunger and quest for the best? If they wont come because of the quality of our team, then let’s throw money in their face; I’ve seen cash perform miracles in parliament. Honestly Manchester United are going nowhere without a real 30 plus goal man up in front, and that will cost stupid money now. We cannot create chances from the middle, as there are indeed few able to create for or replace Wayne Rooney.

As for Chelsea, they might have started off slow but have at least robbed United of Pedro, who can create a way through defenses. They still will miss the brutality of a real goal scoring machine such as Didier Drogba, but my money is on them to come back with Costa ably backed by Pedro.

Now let’s get to Mr Wenger, it is simple, get Benzema or you are dead. If they get him, and this is a big if, I believe they will be in the ICU ward for a while before he gets his English boots. So Wenger enjoy the trophies in the cabinet, I don’t see anymore joining them soon.

The moral of the story in these early weeks lies bare for all to see. You can’t win without a good defense, but strikers are indeed the defining factor in sides today and not the creativity of midfielders.

@RoyKaruhize