Hojlund hammer blow: Ten Hag says new striker 'would help'

Stuart Telford

• 13 Apr 2024 10:30 BST
• 3 min read

Erik ten Hag has publicly undermined star striker Rasmus Hojlund, despite the Manchester United youngster hitting a glut of goals this season.

Hojlund took a while to get going in the Premier League, with his first goal not coming until December when he hit the winner in a 3-2 win over Aston Villa.

The €73.9 million summer arrival from Atalanta had previously scored five goals from six in the Champions League, though, and turned a corner domestically in the new year, with six of his seven goals coming since then.

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In short, he might have been entitled to think that he had done enough to earn Ten Hag's trust, but the Dutchman suggested otherwise ahead of United's trip to Bournemouth on Saturday.

"I think it would help," was his response when asked if it was vital to bring a proven goalscorer to Old Trafford this summer. "You need more options...

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Ten Hag: 'negative impact on results'

"Some positions we didn't have the choices this season - the striker position, the left-back position - and that has a negative impact on the results."

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United have been linked with a host of top strikers, from Brentford's Ivan Toney to Viktor Gyokeres, the former Coventry man who is lighting things up under Ruben Amorim at Sporting CP.

Whomever United sign, it is clear the remit is to bring goals with them, with Hojlund - and indeed teammate Marcus Rashford - not having contributed enough for Ten Hag.

"In this plan we constructed we should have had enough goals," he said. "You count on goals from Rashford - last season he scored 30… and then bringing a goalscorer like Rasmus Hojlund in, it should have been enough goals."

Hojlund is now valued at €61.2m by FootballTransfers' in-house algorithm, and official data partner SciSports tags the 21-year-old Dane's potential ability at 119.3 - well in excess of Toney's (99.9) and Gyokeres' (90.8).