Originally Posted by
the other bob wilson
I can't sleep in these warm nights, so I may as well answer the Gary Holt comparison now. You are right about Holt's scoring record compared to Madine's. In 08/09 Holt scored twenty eight times for Shrewsbury in League Two, this earned him a move to Norwich when they spent a season in League One and he scored thirty times as they earned promotion. A promotion to the Premier League followed in 10/11 as Holt found the net a further twenty three times and so he headed into the top flight having scored eighty one times in three seasons.
At that time, Holt's career had a goalscoring momentum that Madine's has never done and there had to be a reasonable chance that he could maintain that form in the top flight - seventeen more goals in 11/12 confirmed this to be the case and eight the following season was not too bad a return either.
By comparison, Madine had consecutive seasons early in this decade with Carlisle in League One where he scored eighteen times and this was enough to earn him a move to the Championship where he scored four times for Sheffield Wednesday in 12/13. I'd forgotten that he only managed ten goals in Bolton's promotion season from League One, but to get that many again in what was little more than half a Championship season in a badly struggling side was an impressive achievement even if being first choice penalty taker helped his cause.
I accept goals aren't everything, but the large disparity between the number Holt scored in the seasons immediately before he made it into the Premier League and the number Madine has managed in the last few seasons as he reached the same division means that it's hard to make a case that expectations would be similar as they prepared for their debut seasons in the top flight.
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