At first glance, the signing of a striker who can't get into
Fulham's matchday plans may seem a strange one by Lee Johnson. After all, not
only must there be a question over how capable he is based on that scenario,
but despite the departures of Lee Tomlin and the pair of Hams this summer
(Tammy Abraham and Aaron Wilbraham), City have what appears a top-heavy eight
strikers on their books still.
However, that's not the full story. Famara Diedhiou and
Bobby Reid have started the season together, with Freddie Hinds acting as
cover. Milan Djuric, Matty Taylor and Arnold Garita (remember him?!) are
currently injured. That's six, but half are injured. Then you have Gustav
Engvall who has gone back to Sweden, probably for the last time, while under 23
goal machine Shaun McCoulsky is (rightly) learning his trade in League Two with
Newport County.
The other reason Johnson would have been after an extra body
is that although he is 'only' six foot tall, he's more of a target man option
than most of the afore-mentioned list. At Brentford on Tuesday, Johnson had no
choice available to bring on a physical, big option for the disappointing
Diedhiou, and Hinds came on instead. You can argue we had to play differently
than we might have otherwise, say if Wilbraham had been available to come on,
which may have in turn helped us to equalise, but you can understand why
Johnson wants a different option later on in matches and, with Djuric out for
another two months, he had nowhere else to go.
By the way, before we leave our long list of forwards, many
have questioned why we're bringing in a player when Gustav Engvall is scoring
goals for fun in Sweden. It's a fair question, but quite simply, Engvall
obviously isn't good enough. We might have spent a lot of money on him, but
that happens to all clubs. Watching him in the Swedish league he may have
looked quick, incisive, a physical threat but Johnson and his coaching team
have now watched him in training for a whole year, and if he's not up to it at
this level, then he's not up to it. End of.
So onto Cauley Woodrow. The first thing anyone looks for
when a striker is signed is the goals record and in Woodrow's case it's safe to
say that it's not spectacular. The positive however, is that his best spell was
in the Championship on loan with Burton last season, so maybe he's maturing
and, given the right service, can improve his overall goals to game ratio.
We all know fans of clubs can turn quickly when a player
leaves them, but the reaction from Fulham fans on today's news was quite
something else! It seems Woodrow is far from a favourite at the Cottage, and
many were delighted and surprised we were willing to take him on. With that
background, I spoke with Andrew Beck, @arbeck on Twitter, from Fulham fan site,Cottagers Confidential, and asked him why there was that sort of reaction.
"Cauley Woodrow isn't a bad player by any means. He's
probably a fine striker at the lower levels of the Championship or League One.
He also isn't a great fit for Fulham's system. He's not
small, but he's not really big enough to be your typical hold-up forward. He's
not slow and unathletic, but he's not fast and mobile enough to be used on the
wing.
He's got fairly good technical skills, and ideally he needs
to be paired with another forward in a 4-4-2. If you have a speedier technical
player Woodrow can combine well with him. If you have a bigger forward, he can
float around and find space and combine with other players in the attack.
Part of the reason Fulham fans are down on Woodrow is that
they had quite high hopes for him. He was a key figure in some academy teams
that had a lot of success and played a lot for England youth teams. His
development just kind of stalled after that.
I don't think you'll be able to win promotion with him as
one of your two forwards. But I also don't think he would be the reason you get
relegated if he's one of your two forwards.
There's also a chance he figures things out and takes a leap
forward with consistent playing time, he's at the age where players often have
things click and they start to reach their potential. I'd still bet against him
becoming much more than he is now, but it's certainly worth a gamble."
Hardly effusive in his praise and all in all, on that
reckoning, we appear to have a fairly 'average' player, but clearly the
potential has been there through his youth career, and with a run of games,
some goals and a bit of confidence, who knows what can happen?
One thing is certain, he sure can hit a ball. This was Fulham's goal of the season winner and you've got to assume it's not a one-off
from the fact he even tried it. Very few of our players seem capable of hitting
a ball from that distance so that alone would offer a different threat during
games for the opposition defence to deal with.
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