Hojlund fired blanks again at Stamford Bridge
Hojlund fired blanks again at Stamford Bridge
Three goals in 33 games is bad enough but Rasmus Hojlund's body language, and the unrestrained reactions of his teammates and coaches, are just as disconcerting.
Hojlund was complaining to Mason Mount, a sympathetic sounding board, in the second half at Chelsea. Mount offered an encouraging pat on the head and then exited the pitch. Hojlund was suddenly devoid of an ally.
At full-time, Hojlund turned to his fellow Scandinavian Victor Lindelof and was complaining about something or other. Lindelof soon spotted Jadon Sancho and was one of a handful of United players who acknowledged him.
The press box at Stamford Bridge is directly behind the dugouts, separated by maybe half-a-dozen rows of spectators. Ruben Amorim was particularly piqued with a Dane, though it was Patrick Dorgu. His assistant, Paulo Barreira, was most animated with Hojlund.
Another Portuguese, Bruno Fernandes, berated Hojlund in each half. After Hojlund killed an attack, there was that familiar sigh from the United supporters. It was all-too-familiar fare from a striker who is being bracketed with Garry Birtles, Radamel Falcao and Wout Weghorst.
The punchline is Hojlund is certain to start the Europa League final. That could be his swansong as the starting striker for United. Hojlund was always destined to fail, by association with Kees Vos and the inexplicably exorbitant £72million fee United agreed for him at 3am at Atalanta's training ground.
Amorim seriously tried to suggest he is happy with Hojlund at Stamford Bridge. "I’m happy. Of course, all the team has to improve, but the way he runs, he fights for every ball, loses a lot of duels, wins some duels, he needs to improve the connection.
"But he is improving. I’m really happy with him, he just needs to continue working hard and better things will come."
In his question to Amorim, a colleague remarked that Hojlund's performance "left a lot to be desired". Amorim was never going to dispute that.
Senior figures at United are not having Hojlund. One well-placed source suggested he does not work hard enough. They can cut loose as it is well-established that Hojlund will be replaced in the summer. Amorim, though strikingly frank about United's ills, can't.
The coaching staff have been losing patience with Hojlund for some time. Teammates were hesitant about passing the ball to Hojlund last season and it has been more brazen this season.
Off the pitch, Hojlund is so desperate for approval he is resorting to crass captions, clearly curated by a tone-deaf social media team, on Instagram posts for the banter brigade. All he succeeds in doing is imitating Neal Maupay, one of the worst strikers to ever get a kick in the Premier League.
Amorim's 3-4-2-1 system is geared to service the striker, so he was never going to entertain the prospect of picking a strikerless team after Joshua Zirkzee was ruled out for the rest of the season last month. Amorim confirmed on Easter Sunday that it would do no good to remove Hojlund from the team. He has stuck to his guns even as Hojlund continues to fire blanks.
There have been two tap-ins since then and a fine performance at Athletic Bilbao, a man light for 55 minutes after Dani Vivian tugged at Hojlund’s shirt. But the Premier League is the truest gauge and Hojlund will be pitted against Micky van de Ven and Cristian Romero back in Bilbao. That could be as much of a mismatch as two bouncers turning away an underage schoolboy from a nightclub.
Erik ten Hag dropped Hojlund for United's final three games last season and it was a masterstroke. United won all three, climaxing with their best performance of the post-Ferguson era against City in the FA Cup final.
Hojlund came on in all three wins, scoring against Newcastle United and Brighton before a constructive cameo at Wembley. He left the national stadium that evening swigging from a magnum of champagne.
Gaining the number nine shirt in the summer reaffirmed United's long-term backing for Hojlund. Perhaps things might have been different had he not pulled his hamstring minutes after scoring against Arsenal in the otherworldly So-Fi Stadium in Los Angeles. Hojlund required another scan on the other side of the Atlantic as the first was inconclusive and he was out for eight weeks.
Yet Hojlund has been at United for 22 months now and his first season was creditable. It was not unreasonable to expect or aim for an improvement on his 16 goals last season.
Eleven of his 26 goals have come in the Champions League and Europa League. United have a surfeit of players better suited to European competition (Zirkzee, Dorgu Casemiro and Manuel Ugarte to name but four). That is primarily why their supporters have been subjected to the worst United side since they were relegated in 1974.
Tommy Docherty's main recruit that summer was Stuart Pearson. A striker. Hojlund's teammates and coaches seem to be pining for a different striker.