Top 131 Strikers Quotes & Sayings - Page 2

I think you say that strikers win you games, but defenders win titles and I think that's really important.

I learnt at the Euros that that is the level I want to be at. That is where I want to be. The standard of the strikers there was top class. That is where I want to be for a long period of my career.

Strikers in England get less time than in Holland, and it took me a while to get used to that.

In my time at Milan, the club played with a 4-3-1-2 formation, and I was the player behind the two strikers. At Real, I play behind three. There is a greater defensive obligation, but I try to work around the area.

The defenders can be clever and use everything within the laws of the game to stop the strikers scoring goals and, while some pulling is allowed, you need to be clever.

I'm a forward, but I can't be the only forward at a club. Over the years, the clubs who've won titles have had several strikers.

Scoring a goal feels a bit like a liberating act. It is a mix of sensations that only strikers can feel in their own guts. We work for that, to score. It is like a commitment, an obligation we take with ourselves.

The Netherlands have great strikers... but they are only playing one. They are depriving themselves of their best qualities and shooting themselves in the foot.

I think Falcao is one of the best strikers because of the way he plays, more than simply being a player with a lot of class, to define a game, a style of play. He's proven that he's a player who works hard; he's very strong both tactically and technically.

I think really, if I were to defend the K-1 strikers, that it was a pressure of not enough time to re-prepare for a fight and not enough time to repair for a fight as a result of the last show.

There's different types of strikers: Harry Kane is a wonderful finisher, Jamie Vardy has great pace and has come onto the scene exceptionally well and is playing consistently, and Wayne Rooney is a player I have admired during all of his career.

Look at the top strikers like Harry Kane and Sergio Aguero. They are ruthless, and every time they get a shot, people think they are going to score.

Peterborough brought me in to do a job for them, which was to score goals. In the past they brought in strikers like Britt Assombalonga, Dwight Gayle and then shipped them on.

I'm not silly enough to say I don't take note of what other strikers are doing. I was totally aware players were scoring that were in the squad - and of English players scoring who weren't in the squad.

Edinson is the perfect team-mate for players like myself and Neymar. He is always available, he's very mobile, and he has an amazing shot on him. He's a natural goal-scorer, a true professional and a very good person as well. He's one of the best strikers in the world.

The only way you can play with three strikers - which we did at Juventus - is if the three work really hard, and become the first defenders.

To have a manager who has worked with top players, top strikers, who have played in my position, it's always nice to know that when he is giving me information, he's coached these players before so it's important I take it on board.

During my time at Juve, I didn't score more than 20 goals a year, but I won every title except the Champions League. I've scored 15 or 16 goals, and I've lifted titles, and other strikers have scored 35 and haven't won anything.

The standard across Europe is set by Lyon. We're so far ahead of so many teams. In training every day it's 11 internationals v 11 internationals, so I'm having to defend against the world's best strikers every day.

Wayne Rooney would have been great to play with. He is one of the best strikers in the world and this is also a guy who has scored against me every time I've played him.

I look for players who do not just score goals but provide an attacking point, linking with other players and able to see the third man as well. Van Persie is one of the best strikers around at that.

I've had some nice messages after games from players who I haven't spoken to before. I won't name people and drop them in it, but I've had messages from opposition strikers and defenders saying that they respect and love the way I play, telling me to keep doing it and not to change the way I am.

I am joined with no foot land-rakers, no long-staff, sixpenny strikers, none of these mad, mustachio purple-hued maltworms, but with nobility and tranquillity.

For England, I play centre-half. I enjoy it. You face all the best strikers in the world. I enjoy the challenge.

Messi is one of the best strikers in the world, one of the very best players.

The only gambling I do is on a Saturday afternoon when I might put on two wingers or two strikers.

I think a lot of people write off strikers like me, the true number 9 who hangs out at the top of the box. I mean, even I wanted to be a player like Romario as a kid.

The position as a striker is the hardest one in the Premier League. If you look at some top, top strikers, even they struggle to score goals here.

I like the idea of playing with a bit more tactical freedom, either in a deeper role or supporting the strikers more often.

My second year in Rome was very good. Back then, a striker was a striker. Strikers scored goals; they didn't defend. Today this is normal, but it wasn't at that time. If you wanted to play my style of football you couldn't have old players or famous players who were unwilling to do the job both ways: attacking and also defending.

You never know how long a player has left, especially with strikers. Once you turn 30, as a striker, you are usually on the way down, and playing from the age of 16, at such a high level, has to take its toll.

Different strikers are happy when they score but you have to think about the team - the assist and movements which can give space for your team mates. You can never quit. It's teamwork.

The Premier League is a competitive league where strikers can be brought in for x amount of pounds and it might block your pathway as a young player. To go abroad, if it gives you the opportunity to play at the highest level in that country then I think it's a no-brainer.

It's an honour to sign for Manchester United. I am looking forward to following in the footsteps of so many great strikers, bringing my experience and playing my part to help the team compete for the biggest trophies in the game.

Wayne Rooney and Robin van Persie are two of the best strikers in the league and the reason I came to the Premier League was to play against people like them.

I think a lot of managers say that it starts from the front and us as defenders know it helps our job when the front two strikers put that pressure on. If they can do that it makes our job a lot easier.

I quite like being aggressive and horrible which gives you more confidence to dictate over strikers and to make them feel they have had a frustrating game when they've walked off the pitch, feeling very down.

Technical players make the game easy. They have a view of the pitch different from other players. They put the last pass for the strikers. They are the players that lose two or three balls in a year.

You don't need only your strikers. You need your defenders to be on top of their game. You need a midfield to work hard and track back, and I suppose you need a goalkeeper who makes saves once in a while.

At a club like Chelsea, they have the money to buy world class strikers like Diego Costa, and there's also that pressure to win trophies. I just have to stick with it, be patient, and hopefully my rewards will come.

I would rather have a career where I improve year after year than go to the top and then decline. There are a lot of strikers that reached the top before 25, but after 25, they went down.

People can say I've not scored enough goals, but you see the best strikers on the wing in a four-man midfield and see if they score goals. Nobody can really criticise my finishing because they don't really see me playing in a forward position too often.

I spent three seasons at Benfica looking to be in the first eleven. Sometimes I got in and sometimes I didn't. Sometimes injuries denied me. Sometimes the strikers who were in my position, they were scoring and scoring so it was difficult to play.

We center backs had to cover a lot of ground, and we had to be very physical with the opposing strikers.

Ibrahimovic is a very intelligent player and there are very few strikers like him in world football.

Suarez and I are similar and I like facing strikers like him.

I played for Arsenal for more than three years, and I had fantastic moments. Maybe they made me one of the best strikers in the world, because under Arsene Wenger, I learned a lot of things - but you have to move on.

As much as you want to improve or help the team, as a centre-back your job is to go under the radar and keep the ball out of the net. If you do that and let the strikers get all the adulation and the headlines, then you're probably doing your job.

I like to play attacking football, but I think the big difference is that we expect a lot more from our strikers, to do more pressing and to keep compact. We like to play a high line defensively and press the ball.

You have to make the strikers fear you. Make it difficult for them to get on the ball and go into different areas. That makes my job easier.

You can say what you want about the Stephen Thompson fight, but you cannot disregard that me and Stephen went five rounds in a technical fight. Apparently, he's one of the best strikers in the UFC, Stephen Thompson.

I took Kanu on the Tuesday before the first game of the season because I never had any strikers. He said he hadn't kicked a ball since last season and I asked him if he'd been training.

I think growing up in England strikers are hungry to just get goals. We have a mean streak in us. We like to get goals.

The strikers are the first defenders. And the first defender is the first striker to build from the back.

Midfielders, on average, get somewhere between half a second and a second to think before they have to move the ball on. For strikers, however, it is significantly less: between 0.1 and 0.2 of a second before a defender is on them.

I am a striker, and people expect strikers to score goals. But I don't see myself as a striker.

The strikers are the ones that normally go for big, big money because they're the ones who decide the games, nine times out of 10.

All the top players in the world play 45-50-60 games. You need that many games, even the strikers need that many games.

The top coaches want wide strikers who cut inside. They want playmaking midfielders who can play between the lines as well as perform their defensive duties.

If you win the midfield, you probably win the game. But that doesn't mean the players in the midfield are the ones alone who determine that, because now we have strikers who drop into midfield and defenders who move up into the midfield. It is the area you must dominate.