While United’s striker issues this season have been telling, it is hardly a new occurrence at Hindmarsh Stadium.
In reality, the Reds have never had a forward who has scored at a rate better than a goal every other game, and only twice in the club’s history has an Adelaide target man found the back of the net at an average better than a goal every 2.5 games in a season.
The best marksmen in the league are scoring at a ratio better than a goal every other game.
This season in the A-League home and away rounds, Eugene Dadi scored 10 goals for Perth in 16 games (1.6 games per goal) and Sergio van Dijk scored 11 for Queensland in 20 games (1.81 games per goal). Over the course of two seasons with the Phoenix, former Adelaide player Shane Smeltz has scored 21 goals in 39 appearances (1.85 games per goal).
Adelaide’s most consistent scorer in a single season was Bruce Djite during the 2007/8 campaign, scoring 10 times in 20 games in all competitions – a goal every other game.
To find the next best games per goal ratio, we have to go back to Adelaide’s first season as a club, when Carl Veart found the net 12 times in 27 games (a goal once every 2.25 games) in the old National Soccer League.
The third best record belongs to Fernando Rech, scoring 7 times in 18 matches (2.57) in the inaugural A-League season.
The best of the rest include Michael Brooks’ cameo at the end of the 2003/4 season, which yielded 3 goals in 8 games (2.67); Paul Agostino managed 4 goals last season in 11 games (2.75) and Fernando Rech scored 9 in 25 games in the 2006/7 season (2.78).
So far this season Cristiano has notched 12 goals in 33 games (2.75). However, the other two strikers on Adelaide United’s books have yet to trouble the scorers.
Robert Younis (no goals in 17 games) and Paul Agostino (no goals in 10 games) need to have a fruitful Finals campaign if they are to avoid joining the ranks of Reds strikers to score one or none in a season. Adelaide’s gallery of goal-deprived front men includes Elias Demourtzidis and Chad Bugeja, who both failed to score in 12 games. Dez Giraldi managed one goal in two injury-plagued seasons from 21 games.
Nick Budin scored once from 19 games in 2003/4. A young Shane Smeltz was one from seven in 2003/4. Finally, in 2006/7, Bruce Djite scored once in 15 appearances and Shengqing Qu hit the back of the net once in 8 games.
Whilst every football club in the world has had strikers who have struggled to score goals, the statistics presented above show that no Reds forward has ever been amongst the top players in the country, apart from Bruce Djite.
Emphasising this point is the fact that right-winger Travis Dodd is currently the club’s all-time leading scorer with 30.
For the Reds to be successful next season it is vital that they sign a marquee striker capable of matching the best in the country and scoring at a rate of less than two goals per game. Depth in the position is clearly also an issue that needs to be addressed.
Otherwise it is likely that Adelaide will continue to be place an unnecessary burden on its midfield to produce goals and the team’s overall play will suffer as a result.
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