At least Ruben Amorim has promised Manchester United will "try to do something". Goals win games and United do not have a goalscorer. They have won two games in nine and scored 11.

The long-term fix to supplant Rasmus Hojlund will almost certainly not arrive until the summer. Hence why United are being linked with Randal Kolo Muani, scorer of two goals for Paris Saint-Germain this term. This is half as many as Joshua Zirkzee.

Ironically, it was between Hojlund and Muani when United pondered their marquee striker signing in 2023. PSG also bid for Hojlund. A cynic would suggest Hojlund's switch to the SEG International agency that represents Erik ten Hag possibly swung it.

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Muani was a better goalscorer than Hojlund with 26 goals in 50 games for Eintracht Frankfurt. That 2022-23 season in Germany now looks like an anomaly. Muani managed 11 goals for PSG last term and has started twice this season.

PSG found a willing taker in United for Manuel Ugarte but they should not push their luck. The elite clubs United once competed with now view them as gullible addicts, like a croupier seeing a hopeless gambler staggering around the casino floor and about to reach his table.

United helped finance Real Madrid's midfield rebuild by coughing up £60million for Casemiro and they were the first to peer through the Bayern Munich shop window and take a defender whose career had been in gradual decline over five years. It is little wonder Muani and Nuno Mendes, also of PSG, have been linked with United.

It has been suggested United could have Muani on loan without anyone leaving. Ie. PSG would finance the majority of his salary as they are that keen to offload him. That ought to be a deterrent.

Muani was considered in the past so cannot be the answer in the present. It is telling that the two summer recruits with absolutely no link or connection with Ten Hag - Ugarte and Leny Yoro - were bought from clubs in France, where Ineos have owned Nice since 2019. Sir Dave Brailsford and his "bagman" personal assistant, the unpopular Josh Thompson, were in attendance for Yoro's career debut at the age of 16.

Jonathan David, Yoro's teammate at Lille, is the top scorer in Ligue 1 and out of contract in the summer. Lille has become quite the talent factory in France over the past 15 years and David, 24, would be a viable option to move for so United can move on from the Hojlund and Zirkzee errors.

Identifying a striker who trumps Hojlund now and is gettable is tricky. United were limited to Wout Weghorst two years ago and he scored as many goals as he did for Burnley: two. Both were tap-ins.

Since the first winter transfer window in 2003, Premier League managers seeking a short or long-term fix up front has become a theme. Jermain Defoe alone joined three different Premier League clubs in January.

Tottenham sold Defoe to Harry Redknapp's Portsmouth in January 2008 and a year later Redknapp's Tottenham re-signed Defoe. His mid-season switch to Sunderland in 2015 is forever cherished by Mackems for his stupendous volley in the Tyne-Wear derby.

The 2003 window is best remembered for Christophe Dugarry, an elegant World Cup winner with France, swapping Bordeaux for Birmingham City. Birmingham were back in the top flight after a 16-year exile but had won two in ten when Dugarry made his debut. He scored five goals in their final six matches to elevate the Blues to a safe 13th.

A year later, Blackburn Rovers manager Graeme Souness plucked Jon Stead from First Division Huddersfield mid-season. He scored six goals - four of them winners - and Rovers stayed up. The following season, Stead scored twice and was then jettisoned to Sunderland.

The list goes on: Robbie Fowler, Yakubu, Michael Ricketts, Malcolm Christie, Jose Antonio Reyes, Louis Saha, Kevin Campbell and Afonso Alves all moved in January. In 2011, Liverpool spent a club-record £35m on Andy Carroll and £22.8m on Luis Suarez to offset the sale of Fernando Torres to Chelsea for £50m. Elsewhere, Aston Villa committed to paying a staggering £24m for Darren Bent. Demba Ba introduced himself to English football at West Ham that same month.

Newcastle finished a lofty fifth in 2011-12 chiefly due to Papiss Cisse. An inspired investment from Freiburg, the Senegalese plundered 13 goals in 14 games and claimed the Goal of the Season award for his audacious Trivela at Chelsea.

United sought attacking salvation from Juan Mata in 2014, Alexis Sanchez in 2018 and Bruno Fernandes in 2020. Three of their most high-profile signings in the post-Ferguson era. Ralf Rangnick publicly lamented the recruitment department for claiming there was no gettable attacking target in the same month that Luis Diaz and Dejan Kulusevski moved to England in January 2022.

Two years ago, a senior figure at United said they could find a target with the click of a button through their extensive database. The result was Weghorst, who hailed from the same region of the Netherlands as Ten Hag. He is now, rather appropriately, playing for Ajax with fellow Premier League rejects Jordan Henderson, Chuba Akpom and Davy Klaassen.

One hopes for United's sake that Amorim is not considering any of their strikers.