Mark Hughes backs Saido Berahino to make a huge difference for Stoke City by scoring 15-20 goals in a season.
Stoke City’s Saido Berahino
Mark Hughes has bemoaned the fact that Stoke City do not have a striker who can bang in 15-20 goals per season.
Not a single player has reached double figures for Stoke this season, with Marko Arnautovic and Joe Allen being the club’s joint top scorers with six goals each.
This is one area Hughes should rectify this summer, but instead of making incursion in the transfer market, he is pinning hopes on Saido Berahino to do the bulk of the scoring.
Hughes has made it clear that he wants to invest money on bolstering the defence, but has not ruled out an impromptu summer signing to play alongside Berahino long-term.
Stoke City’s Saido Berahino warms up before the match
The 23-year-old forward, who joined Stoke City in the January transfer window for £12 million according to the Guardian, is yet to open his account for his new club.
Hughes said that all the top seven clubs have strikers who can score 15-20 goals in a season. He expects Berahino to raise his game next season and score loads of goals so as to make a huge difference to the side.
He has cited how Romelu Lukaku, the Premier League’s top scorer with 24 goals, has single handedly made a huge difference for Everton this season, and expects the same from Berahino.
“This year, though, without fail every one of them has a 20, 25-goal-a-year striker. If you have that, then that is always going to help you. We have never had one of those at this club, but been able to get top-ten finishes,” said Hughes, as quoted by The Stoke Sentinel.
“Having a striker like that is a huge benefit. You look at Everton. They are a good side, but with (Romelu) Lukaku they are a top-seven side. Without Lukaku, I’d imagine they’d be back in the pack with the rest of us.
“We feel next year we have high hopes for Saido to be that striker, who gets that 15, 20 goals which makes a huge difference.
“But you have to understand everybody else is looking for the same thing and to get those type of players is a significant amount of money.”
Berahino is a highly talented footballer who scored 20 goals in the 2014/15 season for West Bromwich Albion. There is no reason to believe that he cannot replicate the feat again.
Stoke City’s Saido Berahino
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