Why Niclas Fullkrug Finally Solves West Ham's Striker Problem
When it comes to centre-forwards, West Ham have had some real stinkers over the years. But with his blend of technique and physicality, there's a great chance Germany's Niclas Fullkrug can finally be the focal point they've needed for years. Adam Clery explains why, despite his underwhelming numbers, he might be the one.
Transcript
00:00Gooten Wednesday everybody, Adam Cleary from 442 here, and West Ham United have signed
00:10Nicholas Fulcrug, the man with the most James Bond villain sounding name in all of world
00:17football.
00:18And while that is slightly funny yes, and there are loads of other jokes you can make
00:21about West Ham's weird relationship with the centre forwards, is this a good buy?
00:26I say, yeah.
00:31Alright, so first things first, Julian Lopetegui, you are a mystery, you are an enigma, you've
00:37played like three completely different formations in pre-season so far, so we don't actually
00:41know how West Ham are going to set up next season.
00:45Against Crystal Palace they had Antonio and Kudas as like a traditional front two up top,
00:49but then against Wolves I think it was they had Danny Ings, Kornay and Kudas again in
00:55like a normal sort of front three.
00:57From his previous gigs we know that Lopetegui prefers a 4-3-3, but he's also not adverse
01:02to a 4-2-3-1, he occasionally quite likes to have a 4-4-2 if he's got proper centre
01:07forwards to play with, and in almost every single West Ham game so far he's had three
01:13or five at the back, so f**k if I know.
01:16However, straight away that is a major plus point for going out and signing a player like
01:21Fulcrug.
01:22At 31 years old, which I'm not even going to address the fact of giving him a four year
01:26contract at 31 years old, we're going to let that go, at 31 years old he is what is
01:32known as a bit of a late bloomer.
01:34He spent years of his career scrapping around in the German second division and his goal
01:38record within it was never anything that was going to catch the eye, like one in four.
01:42He had a couple of seasons at Hanover where weirdly he looked a lot better in the Bundesliga
01:47than the Bundesliga Zwei, that got him a move to Werder Bremen where weirdly he looked better
01:52in the Bundesliga Zwei than he did in the Bundesliga.
01:55They got relegated, he fired them back to promotion, carried that form on into a transfer
02:00at Borussia Dortmund where he's looked not game changing or at like an elite level, but
02:06certainly very competent and very reliable both domestically and in the Champions League.
02:11Like just to take this one goal as an example, right, both the touch and the finish here
02:16are of a top, top, top level, so he is capable of delivering that, he just wasn't doing it
02:23as consistently as somebody at Dortmund maybe should be.
02:26But the picture I'm trying to paint here is not about his ability, we will get to that,
02:32it is about the fact he's had this unorthodox journey to West Ham United where he's played
02:37in different divisions, in different systems, for different teams, he's done a lot and as
02:42a result, he's very adaptable.
02:45Now at Dortmund, and I don't know how this yellow's going to look over this blue so just
02:49bear with me, he was the focal point in what was like a 4-2-3-1 normally, so he was expected
02:54to be leading the line, to be pushing the opposition back to get on the end of things,
02:58which he did very, very well, but he was also expected to drop, create chances for the other
03:02three attacking players, be a well-rounded complete number nine.
03:07But at Werder Bremen the season before that, he played in a 3-5-2, just like West Ham did
03:14the other night, where despite being a big, tall, strong, strapping, really scary looking
03:18centre forward, he was the small man in the big man, little man combination.
03:23As a result, he would be the one to drop into the space and work with the build-up play,
03:26he would look to get beyond the other centre forward for flick-ons and knock-downs and
03:30stuff like that, completely different way of playing, but again, something he was competent
03:35at.
03:36And that's something I do have to get across about Fulcrug to you, like no point in this
03:39video am I going to tell you something he is amazing at, how he's one of the best in
03:43Europe at this, or the best in Europe at that, but he is probably one of the most steadily
03:48consistent centre forwards at doing everything you could hope to buy.
03:53So as a result, if we look at selected parts of his FB Ref profile, if this is your first
03:57FB Ref profile, just this number here indicates how many times per game it happened across
04:02the season, and this bar is sort of like how that ranks with all the other centre forwards,
04:07a long green bar is good, a short red bar is bad, and none of this, none of this will
04:13be jumping out at you.
04:14Like his shooting numbers are nothing to write home about, he got like 12 goals I think from
04:18like 29-30 appearances in the league last season, that's about what you'd expect looking
04:23at this, although this one thing here that is quite high, that sort of represents that
04:27the quality of the chance he was getting was very good, but whether that's a combination
04:32of Dortmund create good chances, or he gets into good positions, up to you.
04:36His chance creation numbers though, they're slightly more encouraging, you can see he's
04:40not afraid to get on the ball around the box, he plays it in to dangerous areas quite
04:44well, there's a lot of key passes which is anything that goes on to make a chance, and
04:48in terms of his total numbers of chances created, nearly tripped over my own tongue there, scores
04:53very highly.
04:54It's worth pointing out by the way, these numbers aren't just compared to Bundesliga
04:57strikers, this is the top 5 leagues in Europe over the last 365 days, so Bundesliga, Premier
05:04League, La Liga, Serie A, Ligue 1.
05:06Now a little stat that maybe should jump out at you, no pun intended, is his aerial duels,
05:11like he wins absolutely loads of them, he's right in the very top sort of bracket for
05:16players in terms of aerial dominance.
05:18I don't know why they've got a lost one underneath that, because of course that's low with the
05:22other ones, just ignore that red bit entirely, he's very, very good in the air.
05:26Now I know Lopetegui is going to be moving away from David Moyes' style of play, but
05:30regardless, West Ham last season were very good at creating chances from set pieces and
05:36not quite as good at taking those chances.
05:39They ranked 5th in the Premier League last season for their total combined xG number
05:44from set plays, and I know I say this every single time, not everybody cares about xG,
05:49but it shows they were creating a lot of chances from set plays, a lot of good chances from
05:54set plays, and yet, in terms of the number of goals from set plays, they ranked 9th.
06:00So if nothing else, there's a little bit of room for improvement there, and given that
06:03only two of those set play goals were scored by Antonio, the man he's likely to come in
06:08and sort of directly replace, seems like a good move.
06:11All... is it, though?
06:13Like none of these statistics are going to particularly excite you if you're a West Ham
06:17United fan.
06:18If he's coming into the start on 11, it doesn't look like he's a game-changing signing, so
06:23why buy him?
06:24Well there's one main, very good reason why Fulcrum represents a good transfer for West
06:29Ham United, and we've already mentioned it, it's Mikhail Antonio.
06:34Like if you just pull out all these individual numbers for Fulcrum, it's his measure of being
06:39a centre forward, none of them are going to particularly excite you.
06:42But despite the fact he was West Ham's top scorer last season, it's unlikely that Jared
06:47Bowen is going to be seen as West Ham's central focal point.
06:51He might play through the middle on occasion, but he's never going to leave that line on
06:55his own under Lopetegui.
06:56So unless we're about to see some stunning revival of Danny Ng's career, it means Antonio
07:01is who West Ham currently have as their centre forward, and when you compare their numbers
07:06together, you can see why they've made this move.
07:10In isolation, Fulcrum's numbers aren't particularly exciting, but compared to what West Ham currently
07:16have, he represents a massive, massive upgrade.
07:20The quality of his shooting, the quality of his passing, his ability in the air, his ability
07:24to create chances, he's a huge, huge step forward from what West Ham have currently
07:29been working with.
07:30And okay, I might have like saved one really good statistic until this part of the video,
07:33right?
07:34If you compare these two individual stats, their ability to control the ball, to trap
07:40it, to not have it bounce away from them, for the ball to travel to them and it not
07:44immediately go back to the opposition, Fulcrum is fantastic at that, and it's not Antonio
07:50at all.
07:51If you're watching this and you are a West Ham fan, how many times under Moyes last season
07:56when you were trying to defend deep but needed to move up the pitch, did you see that ball
08:02come back straight away?
08:03How hard was it for you to move up as a unit?
08:07In fact, I remember one incredibly vividly being a Newcastle fan, our equaliser at St
08:12James' Park, West Ham were trying to push up the field, they were trying to get out,
08:16we got a lifeline with some incredibly fortunate penalty, they were trying to move up the pitch
08:21and in doing so, they'd taken Antonio off.
08:25So bad at it is he.
08:27In the end, I think it was Paqueta who was up front on his own, West Ham desperately
08:30tried to move up the field to relieve a bit of the pressure, the ball went long, it got
08:35turned over straight away, there was no ability to compete for it in that final third, and
08:40when Newcastle brought it forward, got their heads up, they found themselves as compact
08:45as this.
08:46No presence up front, no pressure on the ball at the back, and all of a sudden, they're
08:51all in this tiny, tiny little shape, because they've pushed out too far, expecting the
08:55team to be able to move up, and Newcastle slice them open with two passes.
09:01It might seem like a bit of a weird example to use, given that Antonio isn't even on
09:04the pitch, but I promise you, if you had full Krug in that side, that goal never happens.
09:10He probably wins the ball when it goes up to him, and even if he doesn't, he competes
09:14for it a lot better, and Newcastle can't make these passes anywhere near as easy as
09:19that.
09:20They genuinely, really change how West Ham are off the ball, and on the ball.
09:24And they really do need that central focal point at the very top end of the pitch, because
09:29we know Lopetegui's big job this season is to evolve how West Ham play.
09:34Like under Moyes, West Ham had the fourth lowest possession in the entire league last
09:38season, because they did not really want the ball.
09:41They wanted to sit back, be compact, be nice and deep, and then hit directly into the open
09:46space onto the counter attack for your Bowens, for your Kudases, for whoever, to then break
09:50through and move up the pitch.
09:51And that's why if we look at Antonio's heat map from the entirety of last season, you
09:55will see his job was not to be a penalty box presence, it was to get into the channels,
10:00to get into the flanks, where he could chase after balls, and he could move his team up
10:04the pitch.
10:05But just to show you West Ham what it is you've actually bought, right, take it all in, have
10:09one big glorious glug of how Antonio plays.
10:15This is Nicholas Fulcrug.
10:17He cares not for your poxy channels or your running after loose balls, he wants to be
10:21in the central area of the pitch, either the box if the service is there, or just outside
10:27of it if he's got to provide a little bit of it himself.
10:30He is a penalty box presence.
10:32He is a goal scorer, he is a goal creator, he is a big, scary, gap-toothed, gnarly looking
10:39bastard that is going to really upset a lot of defenders.
10:42And one final little graph that I may take out if I can't be bothered to edit it.
10:46He came on against Spain for Germany when it looked like they were going out of those
10:50Euros and yes, he wasn't really involved in anything, I'll give you that, but this was
10:55his entire contribution, shots, passes, chances created, everything.
10:59He does not care about getting into wide areas, everything is within the width of the goal.
11:06So yeah, that's the very easy answer to the question, why do you buy a player like Nicholas
11:10Fulcrug?
11:11Well, it's because you don't currently have a player like Nicholas Fulcrug.
11:15And with that, I do declare the video largely finished, if you have enjoyed it, please let
11:20us know what you made of it in the comments below, and of course don't forget to subscribe
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