Why Manchester United needs Dimitar Berbatov

As football fanatics, I think we can all agree on one thing. Dimitar Berbatov oozes class. His stints at Leverkusen, Spurs and United have not just given us some brilliant Youtube compilation videos but memories to cherish as well. Yet a player of such quality, is currently warming the bench at Manchester United and is now a third choice striker behind Danny Welbeck and Javier Hernandez. His 30 million signing from Spurs was the most expensive buy in Manchester United’s history. Sir Alex likened him to a certain legend of United’s past, Eric Cantona, for their similar attributes and style of play. Both are natural center forwards, are very good at linking up play and creating chances, and have a knack of scoring important goals.

• In his first season, Eric Cantona scored 13 goals in 24 games to pip United to their first title in 26 years, when Mark Hughes and Brian Mclair were struggling for goals. His vital assists and inspiration on the field also fired up Hughes to an impressive 15 goals.

• In the 1995/1996 season, Eric Cantona scored 9 goals in 12 games, 5 of them proved to be winners in 1-0 victories and one of the others earned a 1-1 draw. These goals came in the penultimate period of the season, which helped United to the title. He also scored the winner in the FA Cup final against Liverpool to seal a second double for United. In his five seasons with the club, United won 4 league titles and 2 FA Cups which goes to show the influence the Frenchman had in the revival of Manchester United.

• In his first season, Dimitar Berbatov’s 13th goal was a winner at Newcastle, 4 out of his last seven being winners themselves keeping United 7 points clear with a game in hand. He finished the season with 14 goals, 10 assists, and numerous chances which were not converted including the famous ” Berbaspin” assist to Cristiano Ronaldo.

• In his maiden Champions League campaign with Manchester United, he started 5 games and scored 4 goals.

• In the 2009/2010 season, he scored 13 goals for Manchester United and provided 6 assists. 12-13 goals a season, and people say thats not good enough! With a certain Wayne Rooney firing more than 30 goals, is it wrong for Berbatov to play second fiddle and assist him further? Pundits point out, that the two main reasons Rooney enjoyed such prolific form was Antonio Valencia’s dead accurate crossing, and Dimitar Berbatov’s link up play .

• In his first two season, Dimitar Berbatov averaged 8 assists while even Rooney averaged 6.5.

• In the 2010-2011 season, Berbatov scored 20 goals including three hatricks, against Liverpool, Blackburn, and Birmingham City all leading to United wins. His hatrick against Liverpool made him the first United player in 64 years to do so. He scored 2 goals in the fightback against Blackpool, the winner and only goal in the dying minutes of the game against Bolton at Old Trafford, opened Man United’s season with a goal against Newcastle and one of the 2 goals against Fulham to name a few. He also contributed 4 assists.

• The Barclays Premier League performance index (which takes into consideration goals, appearances, assists, match imapct etc) judged him to be the best player in the 2010-2011 season with 581 points, beating second placed Florent Malouda of Chelsea by a staggering 35 points. He also won the Golden Boot award for being the top joint scorer with Carlos Tevez .

Inspite of these achievements Berbatov was left out of the champions league final in 2011, the in form Javier Hernandez getting the nod. The latter did not even produce one shot on goal, and failed to beat Barcelona‘s offside traps time and again. Manchester United were completely outclassed. Again, purists questioned Sir Alex’s decision not to start with Dimitar Berbatov.

Lets take the current season ie.2011-2012 as a case study :

• Berbatov has started 5 games this season, and has scored 7 goals with only 15 shots! Including a hat trick in a 5-0 rout against Wigan to take United level on top with City on the table at that time. Truly amazing for a man, who has barely seen match time, start barely 5 games and have a scoring rate better than a goal a game!

• Even in United’s dismal champions league campaign, he was called upon by Sir Alex to start against Benfica and didnt disappoint, scoring to make it 1-1 while the match eventually finished 2-2.

• He made 3 appearances in the Carling Cup, scoring a goal, and assisting another.

• We also have to take into account, that his last serious run of game time was before the introduction of Javier Hernandez mid way through the 2010-2011 season. It is truly remarkable for someone who was out of the action for so long, to find his goal scoring touch effortlessly.

I think with these stats its safe to say, Dimitar Berbatov has a lot more to give. Eric Cantona also averaged 12-13 goals a season, but was mainly present for his creativity on the field. And thats precisely why the team played around him and benefited with 4 league titles in Cantona’s 5 years at United. I’m not tying to say that the team must play around Berbatov, but they could use him more. When Berbatov was used in linking up play, Rooney benefited scoring above 30 goals. The same Wayne Rooney had to turn creator for Hernandez restricting his goal tally.

You may have observed the highlighting of his assists tally in every season. I have done so, since Berbatov was brought into Manchester United as a striker that can create and compliment Rooney, hence removing the restriction on Wayne Rooney to do so, and to help him score at will.

Barcelona have Messi scoring at will, Xavi and Iniesta creating assists. Ronaldo has Xabi Alonso and Mesut Ozil pulling the strings. Rather than asking Rooney to fall back and create, it would benefit United more if he was just given the job to score.

As United fans we agree that a scoring Wayne Rooney is better than a scoring Javier Hernandez, and to do that, we need the creative ability of Dimitar Berbatov. The same player who scored 91 goals in 200 appearances for Bayer Leverkusen, and 46 goals in 102 appearances for Tottenham because they understood his importance and utilised his services.

As a football fanatic in general, it is a crime seeing someone as artistic as Dimitar Berbatov warming the benches of Old Trafford when he would rather entertain us with his ice cool finishing, deft touches and thunderous volleys.