FM 2016: In Your Opinion...Is Lukaku Worth £40m?

Hi everyone,

I'm currently the manager of Aston Villa as the 2016-2017 season draws to a close. Last year I managed to finish around 8th but this season we're down in 13th (only supposed to avoid relegation, so I'm okay). The decline is in part due to me buying and selling like a mad man, but by the end of the season everyone should speak English fluently and be ready for a more successful campaign next time around.

I'm trying to limit my plans for next season down to a new goalkeeper and a new striker.

I have about £40million remaining from my transfer budget, having recruited a few people for frees and offloaded them for significant fees. I am tempted to splash it all on Lukaku (£31m fee, £9m signing on and agent fee, £90k wage) but this is obviously a significant outlay. He may be the striker to lead my team next year though.

My scout reckons Lukaku is only 3 star rated with a potential of 4 1/2, but he is already 23 and will be 24 by the time he joins me, so the chances of him reaching his full potential may not be high.

For those of you who are a lot further along than me, would you recommend pushing this deal through or looking elsewhere?

Thanks for your help.

John

Welcome to the forums John . Threads like this could be answered in other threads such as http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/437886-FM16-Should-I-Buy-Sell-Thread or the Aston Villa thread as people will be able to answer you better in those .

But honestly? No, I think you'd be able to purchase a better striker + a new goalkeeper for the same amount of money. What sort of striker are you looking for? What role/do they need to speak English? May be able to help throw some suggestions your way.

Out of interest to your current goalkeeper situation - where is Gerónimo Rulli?

Having played 7 seasons with Everton, yes he absolutely is worth the money. Plus, you can sell him for 100 mil euros. I was offered the amount several times by PSG and Real.

Welcome to the forums John . Threads like this could be answered in other threads such as http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/437886-FM16-Should-I-Buy-Sell-Thread or the Aston Villa thread as people will be able to answer you better in those .

But honestly? No, I think you'd be able to purchase a better striker + a new goalkeeper for the same amount of money. What sort of striker are you looking for? What role/do they need to speak English? May be able to help throw some suggestions your way.

Out of interest to your current goalkeeper situation - where is Gerónimo Rulli?

Sorry buddy, I almost posted in the General Forum then thought I was smart when I read to post in here. Turns out I'm not so smart!! Sorry about that.

My current 'keeper is Victor Valdez, who I signed for about £750k 18 months ago. He averages 6.85, but the fans have hated him since day 1 so it's time to make a good signing there!! I haven't heard of Gerónimo Rulli, but will definitely have a look for him. I'm hoping that next years transfer budget will buy a goalkeeper (I'm in March now, so my current budget will buy a striker then my Summer budget should get a GK...hopefully!)

Having played 7 seasons with Everton, yes he absolutely is worth the money. Plus, you can sell him for 100 mil euros. I was offered the amount several times by PSG and Real.

I've read that he regularly sells for more than £60m in the game, but I just can't see why. Do his stats continue to improve even after he turns 25? His current stats don't make brilliant reading.

Thanks for your help.

Sorry buddy, I almost posted in the General Forum then thought I was smart when I read to post in here. Turns out I'm not so smart!! Sorry about that.

My current 'keeper is Victor Valdez, who I signed for about £750k 18 months ago. He averages 6.85, but the fans have hated him since day 1 so it's time to make a good signing there!! I haven't heard of Gerónimo Rulli, but will definitely have a look for him. I'm hoping that next years transfer budget will buy a goalkeeper (I'm in March now, so my current budget will buy a striker then my Summer budget should get a GK...hopefully!)

No need to apologize, just a helpin' hand !. Rulli ends up goin' for a free and he's a world class keeper, if you can get in their and pinch him then you'll in for a treat. Not totally sure what season he leaves in though due to not starting as a higher club yet .

If it helps you this is Lukaku on my Portsmouth save in 2020:

No need to apologize, just a helpin' hand !. Rulli ends up goin' for a free and he's a world class keeper, if you can get in their and pinch him then you'll in for a treat. Not totally sure what season he leaves in though due to not starting as a higher club yet .

If it helps you this is Lukaku on my Portsmouth save in 2020:

Thanks for your help!

From researching, I believe Rulli would have been a free transfer at the start of this season so I may have missed out I'll have a look in case though!

IRO Lukaku, thank you for sharing the screenshot. To my eyes his stats don't look unbelievable (good, but not incredible). Would you mind sharing a screenshot of his History? That way I can see his assists, goals, average rating etc.

One of the reasons I'm leaning towards Lukaku is I have Lincoln on the left who is great, Ganso as an AM who is good and Błaszczykowski on the right who, while aging, is still a great player for me. A striker to score a few goals and assist those guys would be ideal.

Thanks for your help, even if you don't have that screen, it's appreciated.

Lukaku willing to join 13th placed Aston Villa... You should seriously report that as a bug as there is no reason why he should like to join.

Lukaku willing to join 13th placed Aston Villa... You should seriously report that as a bug as there is no reason why he should like to join.

LOL! I agree with you, however Everton have been languishing around the bottom half of the table and he fell out with the new manager 9 months ago, so I think he just wants to go anywhere. Fortunately none of the bigger clubs are interested at the moment, hence I'm trying to wrap my transfer dealings up now

I've just spent £35m on him, making all of my fans unhappy for selling a club favourite in the process, so he'd better be worth it...

LOL! I agree with you, however Everton have been languishing around the bottom half of the table and he fell out with the new manager 9 months ago, so I think he just wants to go anywhere. Fortunately none of the bigger clubs are interested at the moment, hence I'm trying to wrap my transfer dealings up now

I think it still would be worth raising? He is a top quality striker so he should not settle for Villa. It might also be problem with AI being too passively. Would appreciate it as it can only get better if building a team gets harder. Cheers.

I've just spent £35m on him, making all of my fans unhappy for selling a club favourite in the process, so he'd better be worth it...

Please let me know how it goes - I won't be playing FM until tomorrow lunch time

I think it still would be worth raising? He is a top quality striker so he should not settle for Villa. It might also be problem with AI being too passively. Would appreciate it as it can only get better if building a team gets harder. Cheers.

Possibly. I'll investigate the reasons properly next time I play, see if there any any underlying additional reasons to explain. My 8th place finish last year may have helped, but I agree that 13th at the moment shouldn't be good enough to pull a player of this calibur.

I spent £40,000,000 on him and he was well worth it. I paid £16,000,000 in clauses (which were all met in the second season) and £24,000,000 up front.

Here he is in my save, and his goal scoring efforts for me aren't bad either.

He's started pretty well

Thanks for your help!

From researching, I believe Rulli would have been a free transfer at the start of this season so I may have missed out I'll have a look in case though!

IRO Lukaku, thank you for sharing the screenshot. To my eyes his stats don't look unbelievable (good, but not incredible). Would you mind sharing a screenshot of his History? That way I can see his assists, goals, average rating etc.

One of the reasons I'm leaning towards Lukaku is I have Lincoln on the left who is great, Ganso as an AM who is good and Błaszczykowski on the right who, while aging, is still a great player for me. A striker to score a few goals and assist those guys would be ideal.

Thanks for your help, even if you don't have that screen, it's appreciated.

History for league:

Overall for Season 2019/2020 his first Season at Arsenal - he was bought in January btw.

Cracking return for such little time!

My experience is similar - 27 in 26 starts + 8 sub appearances for Spurs in season 3, having signed for 39 million. That's slightly inflated by getting 9 in one game against Sarajevo, I admit!

Given that he's had to rotate with Harry Kane, I'm pleased with his return to date, after two seasons of having no real option other than Kane (well, Charlie Austin, who never fit for us), being able to call on Lukaku is brilliant.

I will offer the following caveat, though - I had a budget of around 140 million when I signed him. If I was working with a significantly smaller budget, I might have looked elsewhere, but having spent the money and fixed the biggest hole in my squad, I have no cause for complaints. I suspect he'd do even better if he was the undisputed first choice. It's very much a coin toss between he and Kane, though - those 9 goals make Lukaku the top scorer, but Kane's been marginally better in the league.

lukaku was quality for me with everton and i sold him for 67 to PSG

Vietto and Emoblo(embola) have been sensational for me

Yes Lukaku is a 40m player. Absolute beast as target man

I bought him for 40m for chelsea.played him as target man attack and he's scored over 100 goals in 2 1/2 seasons for the club.reckon he's one of the best strikers ive ever had in terms of goal scoring.

I've just bought him for £31m (third season as Arsenal).

Needed a different type of lone forward to Dybala so plucked for Lukaku who had been doing very well at Everton.

Not really sure how to play him though, the most obvious way is target man (attack?), wondered what you guys thought? I generally play a control possession style of 4231 with Neymar as an inside forward (attack) on the left and Sanchez as a raumdeuter on the right...

I play him as a Complete Forward (A) and he's banging in the goals for me. He's scored 80 goals in 93 matches and was third place Ballon d'Or last season.

Took him a while to adapt to how I play (which is actually extremely similar to your set-up), but now he is far and away my most important player.

YYYYEEEESSSS! simple

Yes Lukaku is a 40m player. Absolute beast as target man

If only he was in real life.......players need to start 10 yards from him to receive the ball after its bounced off his shin, his first touch is that bad lol!

Thank you all for your replies!

I bought Lukaku for £40m as you all recommended! He ate up most of my transfer budget so I'll be depending on him BIG time this season. I'm torn about whether to play him as a Target Man or Complete Forward, so I'll experiment.

£40m is an awful lot of money, but as some of you have said, he is young enough to make a difference for a long time. I'm excited to get this season started!

He's started really poorly for me. 1 goal in 11 games in the league. Tried him in advanced forward and target man roles but it just isn't happening.

Will give him a few games as complete forward as per the post above and see if that works, if not I'll be selling him unfortunately.

He wasn't that great to start with for me, but he really grew into the side in the second half of the first season.

I got him at Manchester City - he was good enough for me to not need Sergio anymore (who I sold for £60m aged 30). So yes, £40m is worth it!

Finally starting to get somewhere with him. He's now got 3 in 3 by using him as a complete forward (support).

Once again, thank you all for your help. I spent the £40m and so far it hasn't been a terrible investment:

It is early days and he is still learning the squad and I'm still learning how to use him, but I'm feeling fairly confident that I've found someone who will be leading my attack line for the next 5 years

EDIT: thought that picture would have come out better :S

12 apps, 5 goals, 0 assists, 7.07 rating

How's it going now?

I love him this year but in my Everton save he's really weird. Play him in the same role every season and don't change much, I'm constantly successful but some seasons he'll score 12 goals and half are pens and the next he'll score 45 and come 2nd for the Ballon d'Or. Worth 40mil easy though in my opinion.

I signed him in the third season with Arsenal in football manager 2015. He started slowly, but eventually started scoring regularly. He'd go without a goal for a while and then go on a massive scoring streak. He ended up getting about 29 goals and scored a hattrick on the last day of the season to help me win the title against Spurs, which was a nice bonus.

Update on my Save:

I'm playing a Network game with a colleague on my break, and he managed to unsettle Lukaku and poach him from me after only 18 months. I bought him for £40m and sold him for £69m, so made a decent profit...but seeing him go from strength to strength, it's safe to say I'm a little jealous.

Somehow I managed to win the league with Villa after he left, but it was a close call. I bought Berahino and continued to bring through some of my youth and fortunately we won the last day of the season. Lukaku would have made it much more comfortable - he truly is a monster on this game! Do not sell him unless you absolutely have to.

2017-2018 - 26 in 44 (his first season with me)

2018-2019 - 14 in 24 (until Jan, when I had to sell him)

2018-2019 - 4 in 16 (2nd half of the season after being signed by Man City - took a while to fit in)

2019-2020 - 30 in 31 (was injured for a few months)

2020-2021 - 55 in 55 - THIS SEASON ISN'T EVEN FINISHED YET! He still has 10 games or so to go.

Honestly, he has turned into such a beast, I really wish my Aston Villa side had the draw to keep him.

Short answer. I find him the best Striker on the game for or against me. Chelsea has resigned him on my game and I have tried every type of defender against him and still can't stop him. Ignore all the other stats. He is a monster! In my game he had 16 finishing, 17 heading, composure 14 (enough) but most importantly he has pace 17 and Strength 20...the last two make him pretty much unplayable! In my game Vardy who plays for me outscored him but nobody seems to be able to stop him!

He got 16 goals in 37 for Everton, then 28 in 36 for Chelsea and is now 3 goals in 1 game vs me in a 5-2 win to Chelsea (in short he is a massive pain!)