3 strikers that could be the Benteke Crystal Palace crave

After seeing his side lose to a solitary Christian Benteke goal last night Crystal Palace manager Neil Warnock is out to sign his own version of the Belgian striker.

The 1-0 defeat to the Villans leaves Palace above the relegation zone by just two points and Warnock knows that an instinctive finisher could be the difference between demotion – priced up at 13/8 – and survival come May.

“We’re playing well at the moment, but we do need that Benteke – they are hard to come by. We’ll be looking for one of those in the January window and hopefully we can get one sooner rather than later,” he said.

“If we had ourselves a Benteke then we could have won, we’re just missing that point at the front and a little bit of quality.”

With Warnock’s comments in mind, we look at three strikers who could fit the bill.

Michy Batshuayi – Marseille

Trying to find the new Benteke, when the current one is only 24-years-old and not yet in his prime – seems futile but if Warnock is desperate to do so then Marseille’s Batshuayi fits the bill.

The 21-year-old Belgian netted an impressive 39 goals in 97 league outings for Standard Liege before being snapped up by the Ligue 1 giants for around £4m last summer.

He has bagged just one goal in eight games for the French outfit so far and could relish a move to England in order to flourish in the same manner as a number of his international colleagues.

Danny Ings – Burnley

Ings is attracting admiring glances from a number of clubs at present, with Southampton and Newcastle rumoured to hopeful of snapping the Clarets ace up in a free in the summer.

With the in-form striker permitted to talk to new clubs in January, however, Palace could tempt Burnley with an off as low as £3m.

Jermain Defore – Toronto FC

Defoe has made no attempt to disguise the fact that he wants a return to England and after netting 11 goals in 19 games during his injury-hit spell in the MLS the 32-year-old clearly still has an eye for goal.

QPR manager Harry Redknapp is said to be keen on a reunion but with Charlie Austin in fine form the Rs boss might pass up on Defoe – for once!

That could leave the door open for Warnock and Defoe would take little persuading to return to his home city for one final flurry in the Premier League.

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