It's hardly a return to Toshack, Stapleton, Latchford and Birtles, but the summer transfer window has gone some way to reversing a dispiriting recent trend. All of a sudden, the No 9s are back in fashion.
With false nines and sometimes no nines such a feature of the recent Premier League landscape, it has appeared at times as though the route to goal was becoming rather more complicated than it really needed to be.
At academy level, questions have been asked. Why does nobody cross the ball any more?
Now, it seems, we have a small diversion from that road courtesy of a £230million investment in striking talent by Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester United and Liverpool.