Opinion: Will the goal scoring problems continue?

Jamaican international and former Watford favourite Marlon King left the club for Hull City this week, choosing to end his Wigan nightmare for the coming season at least.

Whilst King could be considered only second to Aghahowa as Wigan's worst goal scoring forward in recent times, his move away from the JJB highlights the Latics' weakness in the forward department.

Amr Zaki: Debut goal at West Ham

The signing of Amr Zaki appears to have clouded many fans' judgement, laying all their hopes on the man they call 'The Bull' and choosing to forget about the frailties Wigan no doubt have elsewhere in the striker department.

Especially when the players are looked at individually…

I think the signing of Amr Zaki was a good one although as many of the posters on the message board are aware I have my doubts. There is, however, no doubting that his combined Fifa ranking and international record of 27 goals in 48 games is undoubtedly very impressive but lets face it, much of that is a result of the quality of the opposition. Many of Egypt's opponents in those games will have been of a lower standard.

The same applies to Zaki's league goal tally. In two years with Egyptian giants Zamalek 'The Gladiator' scored a good 22 goals in 54 appearances however the obvious difference in quality between the Egyptian Premier League and the Barclays Premier League means Zaki is very much an unknown quantity in England.

He's had a decent pre-season scoring two goals in two matches but Hell, even Aghahowa scored in Pre-season. I really, really hope he can do the business but other than a few extremely optimistic youtube videos comparing him with Rooney then there's no other real reasons to think he can.

Emile Heskey's injury worries me. Bruce assured "It looks nothing more than a niggle" but we all know how these things can escalate - especially with Heskey. I worry we'll have another season like the last from him because of it.

I honestly feel that with an injury-free pre-season he could've scored 9-10 goals (like he did in 1 of the 2 seasons that he played for us before you all start laughing off that figure) but if this injury does turn out to be anything like the injured that burdened him last season I imagine the strike rate will be nearer to half of that.

Henri Camara: Has he still got it?

Antoine Sibierski is 34 years old and that's starting to show in his fitness. Any player who get's injured during a warm up is obviously coming to the end of their playing days. Because of this he was only used as an impact substitute averaging 20 minutes per game in the second half of the season. Whilst I think he was overrated in this role following two goals against Derby and Chelsea I also think that he did change the game in our favour.

He's got something that our other strikers didn't have - a bit of creativity about him. He's got vision and he knows how to create chances, the only problem is his body doesn't always allow him to do it.

I can't see him having a major say in our outcome this season as I think he'll miss a lot of due to a lack of fitness. However the lack of forwards available means we may be forced to use a less than fit Sibierski if worse comes to worst.

Henri Camara was prolific for us in his first season. He was inventive and a real spark up front, something different. However after an injury filled season last time with us and a disaster of a season at West Ham last term means I doubt whether he still has that cutting edge. Whilst he did score the odd goal in pre-season he also missed an absolute sitter and as aforementioned, even Aghahowa can score in pre-season. I think he's another unknown quantity this time around and could come out with anything between 0-10 goals.

If tip offs from the odd message board poster's contacts are to be believed Bruce could well be near finished in the transfer market with only a centre half, rumoured to be a young loanee from a friend of Bruce, lined up. If this turns out to be true I predict a rocky season for Wigan.

Whilst Bruce is certainly a defensively-minded manager surely a maximum of 4 forwards, 3 of which are past 30 and 2 of which seem to be constantly getting injured, is too few to mount a serious attack on the top half of the table - A target that which we must keep sight of in the coming season if we're not going to stagnate and find ourselves threatened with a relegation battle.