CONFIMRED: Sone Aluko

[LWJ]

Alot of money for another winger

I keep seeing this - winger this, winger that.

Unless I'm going mad, I'm pretty sure we don't actually tend to use wingers. We tend to play with a front 3 or a front man with 3 attacking players behind him - so we are getting players who are comfortable in the final 3rd in any of those 4 positions to allow a fluidity of play. Calling most of our signings wingers is really missing the point of what we appear to be trying to do.

Spot on, this is a hugely popular system nowadays with an out an out striker playing with 3 attacking midfielders in behind him an then 2 holding midfielders playing deeper.
Nearly all the so called wingers we have can play anywhere across the attacking 3 so it makes perfect sense to have 5 or 6 of these type of players to allow for injuries and rotation.
Just need that out and out striker now to spearhead the line.

Bodvarsson isn't a bad option to do that

[Sutekh]

But is he better than McCleary or Barrow? Will he have to wait for an injury to one of those two?

And could Reading field 11 wingers yet?

[Crowbar6753]

I keep seeing this - winger this, winger that.

Unless I'm going mad, I'm pretty sure we don't actually tend to use wingers. We tend to play with a front 3 or a front man with 3 attacking players behind him - so we are getting players who are comfortable in the final 3rd in any of those 4 positions to allow a fluidity of play. Calling most of our signings wingers is really missing the point of what we appear to be trying to do.

Spot on, this is a hugely popular system nowadays with an out an out striker playing with 3 attacking midfielders in behind him an then 2 holding midfielders playing deeper.
Nearly all the so called wingers we have can play anywhere across the attacking 3 so it makes perfect sense to have 5 or 6 of these type of players to allow for injuries and rotation.
Just need that out and out striker now to spearhead the line.

Bodvarsson isn't a bad option to do that

I agree, and if we can get that Portuguese chap in as well then we could have one potent attacking line up with the potential to cause havoc in this league

[Linden Jones' Tash]

But is he better than McCleary or Barrow? Will he have to wait for an injury to one of those two?

And could Reading field 11 wingers yet?

He's the best male member of the Aluko family....

[Hound]

We do have a lot of games to play this year as well

Would expect a bit of rotation with the winger/strikers to happen

McCleary getting flogged into the ground last year was an example of why we need decent quality back up

[Pepe the Horseman]

But is he better than McCleary or Barrow? Will he have to wait for an injury to one of those two?

And could Reading field 11 wingers yet?

Sure he won't have to wait long.

[maffff]

So what does Aluko bring to the team?

Goals
0.16 goals per 90mins - one every 6 and a quarter games.

Assists
0.17 assists per 90mins - one every 5.8 games.

Contribution per 90mins - slightly less than Swift. Slightly higher than Kelly, McCleary. About double Beerens or Williams.

Contributes a goal or assist roughly every 3 games.

Needs 17.62 shots per goal, of which 5 would normally be on target. Takes 2.8 shots per game.

Passes

85% accuracy - 87% short, 58% long.

Averages 40 passes a game

Crosses 2.7 times a game, 25% reaches someone. 15% less than McCleary / Beerens, but more than twice as many per game.

Makes less key passes than our other wingers, although threads a throughball one in every 20 or so.

Aerial

Gets involved on average once a game, wins one in 5 attempts.

Tackles

Just over once a game, 60% success rate.

Makes an interception once every other game, clearance one in 10 games, block once a match.

Yellow carded less than one in every 10 games. Fouls once a game, fouled twice.

The strong point for him.

He runs on the ball 4x a game (more than anyone else in the team, even Barrow), and is successful just over twice a game on average.

Loses the ball 5.5x a game (awful), pretty even split on being disposed and bad touches.

[maffff]

But is he better than McCleary or Barrow? Will he have to wait for an injury to one of those two?

And could Reading field 11 wingers yet?

If you include wing backs, 10 and a keeper is possible.

[RichTea94]

Remember when we played a midfield of 4 wingers under Adkins? It didn't go well.

I think it was Obita-McAnuff-McCleary-Drenthe?

[Esteban]

If this transfer window ends with Aluko instead of an out-and-out centre forward, then I think a lot of fans will be slightly puzzled to say the least. He's not a prolific goalscorer, has an eye for row Z and he'd presumably be displacing a promising Barrow or fan-favourite McCleary.

However, we know Stam rates him, we know Jokanovic didn't want to lose him, the board and management are willing to spend up to £7.5 million on him, and anyone who has watched him knows he is an exciting player, so if that's it for us this window then it's another case of "In Stam we trust".

I think the days of settled line ups are over. Long term injuries aside, I can't see our forwards playing more than 30 games each. Which to be fair is still a lot of football.

[Nameless]

But is he better than McCleary or Barrow? Will he have to wait for an injury to one of those two?

And could Reading field 11 wingers yet?

If you include wing backs, 10 and a keeper is possible.

But by the same token we could field 9 centre backs, a keeper and a winger !
Suspect to get to 10 wingers definitions are getting very elastic ....

[From Despair To Where?]

So what does Aluko bring to the team?

Goals
0.16 goals per 90mins - one every 6 and a quarter games.

Assists
0.17 assists per 90mins - one every 5.8 games.

Contribution per 90mins - slightly less than Swift. Slightly higher than Kelly, McCleary. About double Beerens or Williams.

Contributes a goal or assist roughly every 3 games.

Needs 17.62 shots per goal, of which 5 would normally be on target. Takes 2.8 shots per game.

Passes

85% accuracy - 87% short, 58% long.

Averages 40 passes a game

Crosses 2.7 times a game, 25% reaches someone. 15% less than McCleary / Beerens, but more than twice as many per game.

Makes less key passes than our other wingers, although threads a throughball one in every 20 or so.

Aerial

Gets involved on average once a game, wins one in 5 attempts.

Tackles

Just over once a game, 60% success rate.

Makes an interception once every other game, clearance one in 10 games, block once a match.

Yellow carded less than one in every 10 games. Fouls once a game, fouled twice.

The strong point for him.

He runs on the ball 4x a game (more than anyone else in the team, even Barrow), and is successful just over twice a game on average.

Loses the ball 5.5x a game (awful), pretty even split on being disposed and bad touches.

I think he's a decent Championship player but that's not shouting £7.5m player to me.

[seahawk10]

Fulham fan in peace. No way are Reading paying 7.5 million up front. Alot is probably bonus based.


Aluko is decent. Work-horse. Quick. Some amazing dribbling and skill. Seems to be popular in the dressing room.

He'll frustrate the life out of you with the chances he wastes, but I suppose we are both championship clubs so can hardly expect him to have it all.

I liked him but not sorry to see him go as his agent is annoying.

Best of luck to him and to Reading.

Cheers! Thanks for taking the time to post...

[Victor Meldrew]

If £7.5 million is the actual fee it makes you wonder how much some of our "undisclosed" have been over the years.
It strikes me that Stam is going all out for pace up front (like Liverpool) and the only missing ingredient now is a central striker with pace.

Some of this year's signings have been unexpected but the good thing surely is that the club is making signings-not necessarily the types that we thought we needed but how can you argue with a manager who achieved so much with so little last season?.

IIRC Bacuna can play at right-back so , if Obita's injury is long-term a new left-back would be handy to nearly complete the pack.
Add the speedy central striker and the squad starts to look quite strong-I'm not sure that Bod or Yann will be able to keep up with the pace of any two from three of GMac, Barrow and Aluko.

The future is bright, it's blue and white and (dangerously) I'm starting to feel enthusiastic about our chances given that no team looks outstanding yet.l

[Winston Biscuit]

Aberdeen would get 1.5% of the transfer fee as a FIFA mandated solidarity payment.

[Nameless]

Aberdeen would get 1.5% of the transfer fee as a FIFA mandated solidarity payment.

Really ?
Why would it not be Birmingham who got the money ?

[toppy]

Sky sports saying is done. currently undisclosed, but they believe up to 7.5m

[LightwaterRoyal]

SIGNED! Forward @sonealuko signs for the Royals on a four-year deal from Fulham - [url]rdng.co/SoneSigns[/url]

[LightwaterRoyal]

Link fail. Confimred on Official Twitter page anyway

[toppy]

Aberdeen would get 1.5% of the transfer fee as a FIFA mandated solidarity payment.

Maybe thick - but why?