Kromkamp Ooijer Heitinga Maduro Vennegoor of Hesselink Sneijder Babel Timmer Ooijer 3. Heitinga 4. De Zeeuw 7. Engelaar 9. Melchiot Bouma De Cler Stekelenburg De Jong Kuyt Huntelaar Afellay Boulahrouz Stekelenburg 2. Braafheid Vorm Elia Schaars Boschker Cillessen 2. In fact, neither Sir Alex nor Wayne himself seem worried that he isn't scoring as many goals as Robin. For them and the rest of the squad it's the team and the result that matters.
And van Persie is a team player, beyond question. Coming from a teenager that Sir Alex decided not to sign because of his immaturity, through a hothead who got sent off and was benched for a period before he settled down at Arsenal, he is now an unusually mature man and footballer.
The only question was whether they could play together and form a synergistic partnership. That question has been answered by the stats mentioned above, but also by this analysis which puts Rooney top and Van Persie second as top-rated strikers in the Premier League.
His performance so far for United is at least comparable to that at Arsenal. Last season he was the most influential player from the top eight teams. His Opta stats for the whole of last season showed that as well as scoring 30 goals in the Premier League, he had nine goal assists. Pro-rating his performance so far for United, he is well on target to at least match that. He has eight goals and three assists in 10 appearances, which pro-rates to 30 goals and 11 assists for 38 matches.
But anyone who watches Manchester United will tell you that he is much more than his own personal statistics. His new team scored a total of 89 goals in the Premier League last season, of which Wayne Rooney got Sir Alex is confident that he will get at least 20 this season.
Now you can't simply add van Persie's goals to last season's tally and come up with , but if he does get 30 and Rooney gets 20 you're looking at the highest scoring team in the League.
No wonder Sir Alex is so insistent that United won't lose the title on goal difference. The things that preoccupied people earlier in the season were United's defence, the injury crisis, the conceding first and the general leaking of goals.
They have tightened up in defence in the last couple of weeks and one can reasonably expect that they won't have to score three times to come back and win every match this season. It is very clear from the results so far, how much of an effect Van Persie has had on United. They're currently sitting top of the table after losing to Everton and Spurs. But beyond that, two other factors suggest he will be even more valuable to United than he was at Arsenal:.
He has had a galvanising effect on the team as a whole. No better was this illustrated than against Braga on Wednesday. He came on with 15 minutes to spare and scored a goal of individual brilliance. Arsenal today signed young Dutch forward Robin van Persie from Feyenoord.
The newly-crowned Premiership champions confirmed the highly-rated year-old will join them "on a long-term contract for an undisclosed fee". He is a versatile player and is comfortable playing as a striker or on the wing.
We are all looking forward to Robin joining us for pre-season in July. The youngster, who has signed a four-year deal at Highbury according to reports in Holland, helped the Rotterdam club capture the Uefa Cup in , after which he was named 'best young talent' for the season by the Dutch PFA.
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