But you really have to ask yourself, why has he played so few minutes. Maybe his last club didn’t really rate him either?
When he got a proper run together at MK he was deadly, and his record in France has to be worth something too (I'd be surprised if Ligue 2 is worse than League 1 overall)
League 1/League 2/French 2nd division……yes he can cut it at that level. Nothing I have seen in his career to date which tells me he is anything more than a decent lower league striker.
Not sure we’re having this debate. Cardiff never used him and nor are Watford. Did he impress in the Stevenage match? Listen, I hope when he finally plays he comes in and destroys the league. Nothing will give me greater pleasure……but it won’t happen.
Because your facts are wrong? Because he was young, inexperienced and they had better strikers than the level he was at then. Because he's not fit yet. Hard to make much of an impression in 11 minutes..
It’s all excuse making. He played 40 matches and scored 15 goals in League One, and played 35 games scoring 14 goals in League Two. I seem to remember having similar conversations to this over Andre Gray and his goal per game ratio being so great when you actually break it down to minutes on the field. It means very little. Not sure why people can’t understand not everyone is a good signing. Should be awake to that by now seeing as we’ve all followed the club for the past 4-years. But to admit Healey might not be a good signing puts a dent in the hope we’re at the beginning of a brave new world, so I get it why some people have a problem with that.
Genuinely, what striker out there is there who is just going to pop into our hands that is automatically going to be better than Healey? Wesley doesn't look all that, we could have thrown everything at Kaba and risked the future of the club and it's still not guaranteed he'd have come here over a La Liga team, Nicholson doesn't look as if he'd be a massive upgrade, if at all, and loan deals you're at the mercy of whatever the loaning club wants
Again trying to twist the stats with matches played. 2201 mins played (24 full 90 min games) and 15 goals scored in league one - a goal every 146 mins at League One level. 2583 mins played at League Two level (as a 20 + 22 year old...) or 29 full games - a goal every 184 mins. So pretty much a goal every other game. What an awful record. Not sure what your point is here when you're trying to use goals in matches played as a reason to why he's not very good - which means even less than goals per minutes played. I don't think everyone is a good signing, I was against us possibly signing Wesley, I'm against us possibly signing Nicholson. I think Healey is a good signing (fitness provided) from watching him a good amount at both MK Dons and his time at Toulouse. What's your personal reasoning that he's not a good signing based off of (considering his goals to game record is great and VI has said it's fitness issues been keeping him out the team)?
Minutes means an awful lot more than matches - otherwise a player can make a 1 minute sub appearance and it be counted as a match!
Minutes can also be very misleading. He might be a super sub, coming on in the final minutes against tired defenders scoring the odd goal here and there, giving him a brilliant minutes to goals ratio.
I could ask the same question back, why do you think he is a good signing? As I’ve already explained, he’s a lower league player. Nothing in his career suggests otherwise. Using matches played verses minutes played is not twisting things at all. What you have to look at was when he’s playing in the top two leagues is he a starter or a squad player. He’s always been a squad player at that level. He’s now 28 with an ACL . Is that going to improve him? Seriously, this is why I will not expecting too much from him.
Because I've watched numerous games of his in the last 4 years (I was working with a company who were working with MK Dons so I watched a lot of their games and then Toulouse were a side I watched frequently as they'd gone to a "full data" model for their recruitment which interested me so I'd frequently watch their games to check out their players and see how it was working). Healey was always a very very present danger. Great finisher, great movement, decent pace (despite an odd running style) and good ability on the ball as well. He was one of the leading stars of the team and looked too good for the league (along with van den Boomen - who ended up joining Ajax this summer) I don't know how many times this needs to be repeated but when he was in the PL/Champ he was young, inexperienced and coming from the Welsh league. He looked far too good for Ligue 2 (which is somewhere between lower Champ/top of L1) and looked at home in Ligue 1 last season (although appreciate this was very few mins played) Will it improve him? Of course not. Does that write him off? Also no.
If you look in the transfer thread when he joined some people invested a lot of their credibility declaring this to be an outstanding signing. Someone thought the vast majority of the championship would be delighted to sign him.. So it’s not surprising people are looking for excuses as to why the manager won’t even bring him on when Bayo is having a shocker despite naming him on the bench. I guess the ACL recovery will work for a bit but if he is not able to play 20 mins why have him on the bench? I called it a “Dom Foley” signing at the time and expect I will be proved correct. Edit should add not really referring to Reids here in this post.
I’m not disputing you’ve seen a lot of him, but it’s at a lower level. Maybe this is why you have a personal bias towards him, but I think it’s blinding you on this occasion. I know someone who supports Toulouse and I wanted a detailed fan analysis. He was a big admirer of him but even he said he needs 3 good chances before scoring. So saying he’s a good finisher might be a stretch? An ACL usually makes a player less effective, so we have to throw that into the equation as well. I think Ismael’s comments of what he doesn’t say is very telling. He always mentions Bayo as the only striker of this type of profile the club has and we need more options. He's never really talked about Healey, even though he’s been on the bench. Ismael has never been tempted to use him, which I think is telling. Ok, there’s been some mention of not being fully fit, but I think that’s a red herring. He’s certainly fit enough to play a few minutes. How else is he going to get up to speed?
There's no personal bias. I've watched enough football to know when a player can play at a higher level than the one they're currently playing at. Do I think he's at the level of a PL striker? No I don't, but in the right system he's definitely a good Championship striker and most likely our best option currently - if he'd had the same chances as Bayo has had so far we'd have at least another goal. 53 goals from 41.31 xG since 18/19, so no - he's an above average finisher. Does he sometimes miss good chances? Sure, but that's also pretty much every striker at our level. Because he is - we know VI favours the bigger striker. Bayo is a bigger physical presence than Healey. He talked about him in length on Friday, how do you know for certain he's fit to play a few minutes? Maybe Healey hasn't felt confident enough about his fitness yet and has requested not to be used unless there's an injury to Bayo (a possibility by VIs comments). VI said that he has lots of quality and has trained with consistency but they don't want to put him under pressure yet. I don't think that's telling at all that VI hasn't used him.
Again, may I say, you are just making excuses for the club, without any real proof. It’s supposition. By your own words, you say Ismaël favours a big striker. So, why then did we sign Healey? It’s a logical assumption, when a player is on the bench he is fit to play a few minutes. He had already played some part against Stevenage, which tells me he is able to play. For me, it makes absolutely no sense that Healey is playing no part in league games. If he’s a rated striker why doesn’t Ismaël throw the dice and bring him on? Surely he could possibly pinch a goal to win the game against Plymouth or equalise against Stoke?
Much like, without any real proof and never watching him previously you're assuming that he's crap. I don't make excuses for the club I don't know. I don't work at Watford. I'm guessing they saw that a good striker for our level (that by most accounts they've followed closely for a while) was available on a free transfer so decided it wouldn't be the worst idea in the world. Indeed - he might be very well be able to, or as previously said - maybe he still isn't fully confident on it so doesn't want to risk it, maybe it didn't feel right at Stevenage - there's a whole variety of reasons as to why he's not played yet, sadly neither us of know one way or another.
I don’t think he’s crap. I’ve never once said that about him. I’ve repeatedly said he’s a lower league striker recovering from an ACL. He’s a chancer’s punt, and nothing you’ve said has convinced me otherwise. I look at the evidence, and make a judgement call. The fact the club think he’s decent is hardly an endorsement seeing their recent track record. I’ll happily eat my words if he becomes a regular first team starter of choice, but I just don’t see he’ll ever be this under the current manager.
I hold my hands up..I was one of them! He was very impressive in France, and a goalscorer is a goalscorer whatever the level. So I have to admit so far I’ve been disappointed. No league appearances off the bench, and when we did see him in the Cup he missed a decent chance plus the all important penalty. The impression one gets from looking in from outside is that VI hasn’t liked what he’s seen so far. Only time will tell though. Still very early days, although if we do ever sign this mythical number 9, you imagine it will push Healey further down the pecking order. By the way, I know the way of things on the forum is to either take one side or the other, be it on the ownership or players or the manager or prospects for the season etc, and seems Healey is the latest to divide us all into two different camps. That’s a pity because of course if he does come good, that’s of benefit to us all! I still hope he will be more Kevin Phillips than Dominic Foley, but it’s not been the start I was hoping for! Not a dig at you btw as you’re a person I always enjoy reading, even though you’re firmly in one camp and hard to persuade otherwise!
More than happy to be proved wrong on Healey just struggling to see how he gets game time if we get a new number 9 and Bayo becomes then backup. Maybe he’ll be a hit under manager number 2 this season with a new approach
If the new number 9 is as limited as Bayo, Healey will get time if he can get fit enough to be able to run.
Paul Furlong, Danny Graham, Marlon King, Kevin Phillips, Troy Deeney had only scored goals at a lower level before they joined us, they had no track record in the second tier that suggested they could do what they did. Think it's a bit more of a nuanced discussion than 'he's never scored goals in the Championship before, therefore he can't'. Having said that, after the first game we've not really created a great deal for the strikers so unless we can fix that, chances are anyone will struggle...
Realistically, is there a striker available who has the same track record in the Championship that Healey has in Ligue 2 and the lower leagues? How much would they cost? We created enough to win against Plymouth, who knows, maybe Healey would have gobbled up that late chance (think 99% of footballer could have taken that chance Bayo missed from point blank range against Stevenage...)
I remember being **** scared that Britos would repeat his red card performance at Preston in the league, turns out I was right, but regardless, he was a very good defender!
Can go the other way too, Domingos Quina got a free pass for ages because of that rocket he scored on debut against Reading in the League Cup! Does feel like people are generally more likely to prematurely write off than overhype though...
TBF he did look mustard in that first game, who knew it would take him a whole season to recover from it?
