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Daryl Dike scores for West Brom in return from injury

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Daryl Dike made a triumphant return from the torn Achilles he suffered last spring, scoring in his return to action on Sunday in West Brom’s FA Cup victory over Aldershot Town.

The American striker scored in the 27th minute of West Brom’s 4-1 win, earning the start in his first game action since April of 2023.

Dike joined West Brom in December 2021, but has been limited to just 27 combined appearances due to injuries. The former Orlando City striker could be a crucial returnee for the Baggies, who are fighting to earn promotion back to the English Premier League.

Dike scored seven goals last season prior to his season-ending injury, which ranked as the second-most on the West Brom roster.

The Baggies sit fifth in the EFL Championship this season, but are only three points clear in the playoff places.

Comments

  1. Happy for DD! Kids a good player and comes from a great family. I hope he can enjoy a run of healthy years AND great form. He a lot to handle when healthy.

    Reply
  2. …and reminding everyone once again what a natural finisher he is.

    Glad to see him back. There’s probably next to no chance West Brom catches Ipswich Town or especially Leceister City but Brom is solidly in those #3-#6 playoff spots…so it’s not out of the realm of possibility Dike could actually be in the Prem next year. West Brom definitely got him back at the right time.

    Reply
    • His best chance to be in the EPL next year is , going forward, to go on one of his tears and score a ton of goals.

      There’s a market for goal scoring #9’s. And if you’re not coming from another Top 5 League club, the Championship is not a bad place to be from.
      Coming out of the Championship, Ivan Toney had 31 goals and 10 assists in 45 games there.

      And he might be valued at 100 million last I heard.

      Daryl is on 16 goals and 1 assist in 49 games in the Championship so he has some catching up to do. But if he finishes with a flourish of productivity that will draw attention regardless of where WBA finish.

      Reply
      • I’d love to see it happen and I’ve always been unsure what his actual ceiling is. His performances with the Nats have been underwhelming to put it mildly, but he’s scored goals for fun in MLS and the Championship and I’m genuinely curious to see if that would translate to the Prem as well, or if he hits a ceiling like Jozy Altidore always seemed to.

        I’m not sure, myself, and I’d love to watch it play out. Dike’s game really isn’t a ton like Altidore’s, though. He’s a lot more poacher than a guy who likes to play with his back to goal, which is what I suspect has really hurt him with Berhalter’s system.

      • quozzel,

        With Gregg being manager for life, I doubt that Daryl will ever earn more than a handful of caps and almost none in a big tournament like the World Cup , or Copa America.
        I’m not sure what Gregg’s ideal #9 looks like but I suspect it looks more like Flo, Pepi or Josh than Daryl.

        If you expect to get the best out of Daryl your attack needs to be built, more or less, around him. I don’t see Gregg being comfortable with that. I know Gregg was famous for making a scoring center forward out of Gyasi but it’s not the same thing here.

        The USMNT right now is Pulisic’s team. If they need a goal most likely he will be counted on to score it. If Weah, Flo and Pepi continue to develop that may change, but right now that’s how it is.

        Jozy doesn’t remind me of Daryl.
        Jozy was more complete.

        Jozy was more like what Gregg probably wants, a versatile wing forward type ( think Marcus Rashford) who was most dangerous when on the counter. By the way, Gyasi started out as a wing forward. He was great at it. In the 2010 World Cup Jozy and Clint did all the heavy lifting, taking on the defenders and getting roughed up and kicked to pieces and making tons of dummy runs to draw defenders out of position.

        This freed up LD to have what I feel was his best World Cup.

        Can Daryl do that dirty work stuff? Sargent can but Daryl? I don’t know.

        Jozy was happiest flying at goal with the ball at his feet. That’s Jozy at his best. Interestingly I once researched his USMNT goals and found most of them came off of assists from two guys. LD and Fabian.

        The big hulking, back to the goal “poacher” ( you say that like it’s a dirty word whereas I see it as a complement) was Jozy at TFC. He bulked up after years of chronic hamstring pulls where he was getting hurt just getting out of bed. In other words he couldn’t really run or move like he used to anymore. He was not a classic target man in his younger days. I saw him do it once when he was at Sunderland and they played Liverpool. He was awesome and dominated the box. It probably was his best game there. But it seems like they never asked him to do that again. Jozy was shit there, much like Brenden Aaronson is today. No confidence.

        You can make all the snide, snarky comments about Holland that you want but at AZ Jozy finally found a tough manager who knew how to use him and set him up properly with a solid system and players who could get him the ball in favorable situations. That’s the best he ever was and there is a reason for it. Gertjan Verbeek, who also turned Mike Bradley into a big goal scorer for one season at Heerenveen, saw what he did best and worked to maximize that

        Everyone else had some fucked up idea of what Jozy was and tried to fit him into it.
        Jozy was at his best with AZ and the USMNT two teams that knew who he was and how to use him.
        What is remarkable about his 42 goals for the USMNT is that at no point was he ever the #1 scoring option for the USMNT. It was always either LD or Clint.

        Daryl is a hell of an athlete but I don’t know if he is even half the soccer player that Jozy was. I just hope he and our other #9’s don’t get as badly managed as Jozy was.

        I don’t know what you mean about Jozy hitting a ceiling as if that was a problem. Doesn’t every player have a ceiling?

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