Nicolas Jackson was sold by Chelsea in the summer for an initial £47.5m. Seven goals into his Aston Villa career, two of the best-known voices in English football are asking whether it was a mistake.
Neville: “a handful”
Gary Neville opened the discussion on Stick to Football. “Is Nicolas Jackson the most improved player in the Premier League?” he asked. “I always thought he would be a good signing for someone because he’s a handful, I would hate to play against him. I do like him.”
The numbers support the question. Jackson has scored braces against Fenerbahce and Manchester City, and his finishing, the weak point of his Chelsea spell, has looked sharper. Villa have found a striker who threatens in behind and forces the back line to drop deeper.
Wright: the confidence is visible
Ian Wright was just as warm, and his argument is about what changed rather than what was always there. “When you watched him at Chelsea, yes he missed chances but everything else about his game… the way he makes runs, plays on the shoulder, his touch… you knew that if he could just start nicking some goals, he would be fine,” Wright said.
“You’re looking at him now after scoring a few goals and you can actually see the confidence in him. He could go on a run at Villa, it’s up to him now where he goes.”
That is a fair summary of the modern striker’s problem. The raw tools were never in doubt. What separates a frustrating forward from a prolific one is often a spell in which chances go in and belief builds.
There is a wider point in what both men say. Neither is claiming Jackson has become a different player. Their case is that the same player, with the same movement and the same touch, looks far more dangerous once a few chances have gone in, and that this kind of improvement is easy to miss from the outside while the misses are still being counted.
The Chelsea question
The awkward part for Chelsea is the timing. Joao Pedro is injured, and in the 2-0 defeat by Tottenham Morgan Rogers was used as the central striker. Bryan King asked “why the hell have they got rid of Jackson?” and argued that Rogers “isn’t a centre-forward” and is a player who prefers to come on to the ball rather than play with his back to goal.
Chelsea do have Emmanuel Emegha available after his debut off the bench in the League Cup defeat by Liverpool. But the argument being made is about depth: by selling the player who was meant to be Pedro’s cover, they left themselves with a single specialist striker.
It is worth keeping the counter-view in mind. Selling a player in the summer is a judgement made on the information available then, and Jackson’s form at Villa is only part of the picture. A seven-goal start does not make a career, and Jackson has been criticised sharply before.
For now, though, Neville and Wright both see a striker who has found his level, while Chelsea work out what their forward line looks like without him. Neville was also at the centre of this week’s debate over Michael Carrick’s future, which we covered in our piece with Carragher.
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