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I can barely remember him playing for us, it took me a while to recall that he did. Anyway as a casual fan of St Pauli I couldn't help noticing that he has now scored 8 in his first 11 games there to help steer them away from the relegation zone in Bundesliga 2.
Anyone else see the potential at the time or was it a case of file under Jorn Schwinkendorf?
Looked good in the pre - season friendly against Wolfsburg
Saw him play a few Under 23 matches for us after it became clear he was being frozen out at City. I can’t remember seeing much to suggest he would do well for Schalke when I saw him, but I would guess he would have had a problem getting himself motivated for such games.
Maybe a way to get a guide as to how good he is/was is to think that Austria and Wales have been roughly equal in terms of world rankings throughout Burgstaller’s career. He’s thirty one now and has won twenty five caps, scoring a couple of goals. Trying to think of a Welsh player who comes close to that type of international CV, Tom Lawrence and Jonny Williams spring to mind - they’re both younger at twenty seven each, with the former having scored three times in twenty one matches and the latter once in twenty seven, so there’s a chance they’ll have significantly more caps than Burgstaller by the time they reach his age, but, at this stage of their career, neither of them are certs for the Welsh squad to play in the Euros if they go ahead.
Based on that, Burgstaller would appear to be someone who could have been good for us in the Championship if he had been given a chance when he was in his early to mid twenties but I accept, it’s a bit of rough and ready way to try and judge him.
To be fair he has scored over 100 goals in his career, all of which came in Austria or Germany. None in his 3 League appearances with us, although I seem to remember he scored in a League Cup game. An expensive misfit with us, he went to Nurnburg and scored 33 in 63 games, and then went to Schalke 04 in the Bundesliga and scored 24 there too. And they paid a fee for him. Looks like he was frozen out by OGS and then Slade , but has done well since. Not sure what the problem was though? Him or the Club?
A far more positive assessment than I expected. I guess as so often, it's a case of timing. When Burgstaller was around we had that many players under contract we resembled an American football roster
From what I remeber he did OK, just not given enough game time to judge how good (or bad) he was.
Russell "Yes sir, no sir, three bags full sir" Slade was under strict instructions to bomb out all foreigners