Reports emanating from The Sun this week have suggested that West Brom striker Salomon Rondon will be available for a supposedly ‘cut-price’ £16.5million this summer, if the club’s relegation is finally confirmed. Amongst his potential suitors, it’s Watford, notable for their current almost total lack of functioning strikers, who are apparently in pole position to capture the Venezuelan’s signature.

This news gives rise to two fundamental questions.

Firstly: is Salomon Rondon an improvement on Watford’s current crop of strikers? The answer: almost certainly.

Secondly: does that make him worth an outlay of £16.5million, and the answer to all of Watford’s current striking woes? The answer to that is not quite so certain.

Looking at the pure facts, Watford don’t necessarily appear to have a huge problem when it comes to goals. Only eight teams (six of which being the traditional ‘top six’ clubs) have scored more goals than the Hornets this season, and one is West Ham, who have managed to register a grand total of 43; one goal more than the Hertfordshire club’s 42.

The problem is where those goals have come from. Going into Gameweek 37, two matches from the end of the season, Watford’s top scorer is still Abdoulaye Doucoure; a star in his own right, and someone who is heavily rumoured to have attracted the attention of some of the biggest clubs in the country, but also a box-to-box, frequently defensive central midfielder. Adding to that, he remains top scorer with just seven goals, despite the fact that the last time he hit the back of the net was well over 3 months ago, against Southampton on the 13th of January.

Below Doucoure, Watford’s striking triumvirate of Troy Deeney, Andre Gray and Stefano Okaka sit respectively second, fourth and joint-ninth in the charts. Deeney, who has spent the majority of the season as the first-choice centre forward, sits in second place with just five goals. This is a particularly poor return when we consider that, thanks to his role as the designated taker, three of those five goals were penalties. Gray, who has fallen out of favour under Gracia, has displayed his own issues with finishing countless times, leading to a return of just four goals, whilst Okaka and his one league goal share ninth position with such goalscoring luminaries as centre backs Miguel Britos and Molla Wague and right back Kiko Femenia (Molla Wague, who has made five appearances for the club, was left out of the 25-man-squad list for the second half of the season).

So, with only one of the men charged with delivering even reaching halfway to double figures, there is undoubtedly a need for quality additions, should Watford want to avoid going backwards next season. The reported interest in Salomon Rondon is a response to that. But how does he fare by comparison?

The big Venezuelan, listed as 6’1’’ and 86kg, is a very capable target man and hold-up player; something that Watford are currently lacking. Neither Deeney nor Gray are particularly talented in that role, and whilst it is fully in Stefano Okaka’s wheelhouse, it’s profoundly rare that he is on the pitch to carry it out, either through lack of fitness or lack of a coach willing to pick him to feature in the match day squad. Rondon is more mobile than his physique might suggest, and knows inherently how to play as a lone centre-forward, making runs and creating threats by bringing teammates into play; another thing that Watford’s crop have often proved themselves incapable of this season.

The issue, however, is that over the course of his career to date, encompassing multiple spells in both Russia and Spain before his arrival in the Black Country, his strike rate is almost exactly one in three; a comparatively low figure for a Premier League team’s main man. Although it was slightly higher in the Russian Premier Liga, since he has been in England, that rate has fallen further: during his three seasons at West Brom he has never reached double figures in the league, collectively registering 24 goals in 106 appearances; a strike rate of marginally under one goal every four games. Troy Deeney, in the same period, has actually scored four more goals in two fewer games.

It must be remembered that for the vast majority of his time at the club, Albion were possibly the most defensive club in the league under Tony Pulis, registering 19th for overall goals scored in the striker’s first season (15/16), 13th in his second, and 18th, as it stands, in the current season. The question that results from that remembrance is, would Rondon be more likely to score goals in this Watford side, and is his overall play worth more than the strikers he would be displacing?

In terms of his overall play, it’s hard to argue that he would not be an improvement. It’s become increasingly apparent to all those who have watched Watford on a regular basis over the past couple of seasons that Troy Deeney isn’t capable of performing at the level required when asked to fill the role of a lone striker. He consistently fails to exhibit the required movement, and his noted physicality doesn’t quite translate into an ability to bring down or retain the ball for others around him. Rondon, on the other hand, has proven his own ability to function in the role from the off. He is a modern centre forward, also adept at winning aerial duels and dragging opposition centre backs out of position; he has won 157 aerial battles this season (by far the most of anyone on his team) to the Watford captain’s 132.

In considering whether he may score more goals, perhaps we should take at look at the two clubs’ midfields. For Watford, midfield is their position of greatest strength: they can boast the likes of Doucoure, Nathaniel Chalobah, Tom Cleverley, Will Hughes and Etienne Capoue, feeding more advanced players that include Roberto Pereyra, Gerard Deulofeu and Richarlison. By contrast, West Brom’s midfield is far more functional: the four midfielders who have played the most minutes for them this season are Jake Livermore, Matt Phillips, Gareth Barry and Chris Brunt.

Watford have completed over 2,000 more passes than the Baggies this season (14,841 to 12,629), which works out to just under 75 passes more per game on average, with a slightly improved 75% pass accuracy compared to Albion’s 72%. As midfielders who have at least some responsibility for building play and creating opportunities, Pereyra (84%), Doucoure (83%) and Will Hughes (80%) all have average passing accuracies in the 80s, notably higher than Barry (76%), Phillips (73%) and Brunt (73%). It’s possible that, with more accurate creative midfielders behind him, who are likely to fashion more opportunities than the ones he currently plays in front of, Rondon could flourish and significantly increase his numbers. Those midfielders could in turn find themselves with more space and freedom to create with the work Rondon puts in ahead of them.

There is, though, also reason for caution. One element West Brom definitely have the edge in is crossing: this season, they have put in 752 crosses; 71 more than Watford’s 681, and have delivered a higher percentage of those successfully. The Venezuelan target man is head and shoulders above any of his teammates aerially, and has scored almost as many goals with his head as with his feet. If Watford aren’t going to play to his strengths, then it’s hard to see whether paying almost £17m for a player who will be 29 within a month of the beginning of next season is a worthwhile investment.

Fundamentally, it comes down to whether or not you believe Rondon is likely to adapt quickly to a team with the capacity to play slightly less direct football and lean more towards working the ball through midfield to create opportunities. It’s certainly possible, but there’s no easy way to tell without seeing it happen.

Having attempted to delve into the stats to find any indicators to help appraise him as a signing, I have to admit to being almost as confused as before I started. £16.5m is not what it once was in the financial Wild West of football that is the Premier League, and is no guarantee of quality. Andre Gray himself was signed for a fee rising to a potential £18m, and it’s plain to see how that’s turned out. The going rate for that old chestnut, a striker who can come in and promise you 20 goals a season, seems to have headed north of £30m, and there are only so many clubs who can even think of that kind of expenditure, even in these relentlessly bourgeois days of tv deals and parachute payments.

Whether you think Rondon would be a smart investment for the Golden Boys might well come down to how much weight you put on whether or not a player is Premier League Proven™. If you don’t, you might be hoping that that money will be put to use on a younger, more prolific striker from an overseas league; a bit more of a gamble, perhaps.

Now, where that player is going to come from is something that gives rise to a whole new set of questions.