Villarreal looking for another “number 9”

Interesting article by Sr. Lizarraga in the local EPM paper today. He confirmed that Sr. Roig Neguroles met with Fran Escriba in A Coruña, and Villarreal is looking for someone to add as a number “9”.

Roberto Soldado is training with the first team now, but it will be March before he is available. Lizarraga’s take on Santos Borré is similar to many opinions expressed on here—he’s got talent, but he is far too ‘green’ and is not ready for this level. As for Alexandre Pato, he had a great match in Gijon, but overall.....while the match at the Riazor was perhaps one of his poorest, he was dispossessed of the ball constantly (I stopped counting at 15 times) and just seemed to drift around on the fringes of play far too often.

Perhaps Villarreal did try to make a move for Simone Zaza, though I can’t imagine we would have agreed to the sort of compulsory purchase option Valencia did (€16m I believe if he plays 10 matches).

If we add another striker, having six strikers makes no sense. Maybe we will try to end the Santos Borré loan after all. Or move Pato?

Alfred N’Diaye is still on the fringes of the team and I expect will move to Ligue Un if Villarreal gets a good offer. Regardless, my sense is Villarreal has a little money to play with to improve things, but signing someone with a €10m+ price tag (or purchase option) is not in the cards.