Well, CITY fans, the front office finally went and did something BIG in the attacking third. Word out of both MLS and Turkey is that St. Louis has agreed in principle to bring in 27-year-old Danish attacker Carlo Holse from Samsunspor, with the fee being a record for STL, landing somewhere in the $6 million range, and Holse coming in as a Designated Player. To top that off, this looks like a move Holse wanted. At 27 and in his prime, he’s leaving a comfortable role in Turkey to come to MLS as a Designated Player. While the personal details behind his decision haven’t been made public, the fact that he’s actively choosing this step is a good sign. A motivated player in his prime years tends to integrate well.
So who is Holse? Left-footed, 5’10”, and slippery, he appears to be the kind of attacker who lines up off the right so he can cut inside onto his good foot. Looking at some tape, he’s someone who’s honestly a central creator as well. Wikipedia still lists him as a right winger, while Transfermarkt and FotMob file him under attacking midfielder. That disagreement is the scouting report in a nutshell. He’s drifted inside as he’s gotten older, and he can play either 10 spot or even slot into central midfield in a pinch.
The résumé is solid without being flashy: FC Copenhagen, a few good years at Rosenborg in Norway where he was one of the league’s better assist men, and then Samsunspor since 2023. This past season in the Süper Lig he put up 8 goals and 3 assists across more than 2,600 minutes with a 7.22 average FotMob rating — a dependable, week-in-week-out starter, not a guy who disappears. He’s also got fresh European knockout experience from Samsunspor’s Conference League run, so the lights won’t be too bright.
Is he a superstar? Not really. He’s got exactly one senior cap for Denmark’s NT, which tells you all you need to know about his ceiling. Denmark’s got a stacked attack and he’s never seen a fixture. But “reliable prime-age creator with real end product” is a genuinely useful thing to buy, and the ~$6M fee is right in line with his market value. No overpay.
“Wait, isn’t this our new striker?” Let’s just address it, because it’s the first thing a lot of you are going to think when you see “DP-level attacking signing” next to a team that struggles to score: nope. He’s not a striker. He can score, yes, but he’s not a 9. I know that’s a little deflating, so let me show my work instead of just asserting it. Every outlet that tracks him tells the same story… Wikipedia has him as a right winger, while FotMob classifies him as an attacking midfielder, and Transfermarkt lists him as attacking midfield too. Not one of them says center forward. He’s a 5’10”, left-footed guy whose entire game is dropping into pockets and creating. The “receive it and pick a pass” archetype, not the “bully a center back and finish the cross” one. Even his career-best haul was 8 goals in a full Süper Lig season from a wide-slash-central creator role. That’s genuinely good production for that job. It is not No. 9 output, and it never has been.
Now, could Damet get cute and play him centrally as a false nine, dropping deep to drag defenders out while runners attack the space behind? Sure, that’s a real option, and it might even look nice for stretches. But that’s a creator wearing a striker’s number, and it doesn’t put a natural finisher in the box, and honestly it might make the “who’s actually converting these chances?” problem worse, not better.
The fit: welcome to Marcel Hartel’s house. Here’s where it gets interesting. Yoann Damet loves the ball, and the still-preferred 3-4-2-1 for CITY puts two creators right behind the striker. Pair Holse with Marcel Hartel and you’ve suddenly got two guys who can pick a lock between the lines.
The dream version: Hartel and Holse rotating, combining, dragging center backs out of position while Eduard Löwen - who’s already chipped in goals and assists this year, including from the spot - steps up from deeper. That’s a lot of invention for a team that’s been starved for it.
The slightly-less-dreamy version: they’re both left-footed, they both want the ball in the same central pockets, and neither one is a burner who stretches a defense by running in behind. Stack two similar creators and you can end up with gorgeous possession that stalls 25 yards from goal. Which, uh, might sound familiar.
The elephant in the room: where’s the striker? Let’s not sugarcoat it. CITY’s problem in 2026 hasn’t been creating so much as finishing. The scoring’s been spread thin. Hartel leads the team with just four goals, and everyone else is clustered at one or two. The club STILL CLEARLY NEEDS a proper mobile No. 9 to give these creators someone to actually feed. So buying another creator with a DP slot is defensible only if a striker is already on the way.
The verdict: this is a good signing. It’s fair value, it’s a prime-age player who genuinely chose you, and he fits the way Damet wants to play. On its own, call it a solid B+. But it’s a B+ that becomes a legitimate A the second a real striker walks through the door, and slides back toward a shrug if one doesn’t. Holse isn’t the guy who single-handedly fixes the goal drought. He’s the guy who makes the goal-scorer look great. CITY just needs to go get that goal-scorer.
Right player. Now finish the job, Corey Wray.
