Matthew Gilks - Nobody can deny this lad his spot in this weeks team of the week. Blackpool outplayed Newcastle in every position on the pitch this weekend, but nobody stood out more than Matt Gilks. A host of absolutely world class saves kept Newcastle at bay when they found their way into the Blackpool area much to the frustration of Andy Carroll and 49,000 other geordies.
Paulo Ferreira - It should really go without saying that the Chelsea strike-force is nothing short of potent, scoring no less than thirty one times in their previous six premier league matches. However, in the same six games the Chelsea defence had not conceded a single goal. Paulo Ferreira, in my opinion a brilliant servant to Chelsea, has a hand in both of these impressive statistics, and against West Ham he shows this to scarily efficient effect. Solid at the back, but bombing beyond his midfield to provide balls into the box that Beckham himself would be proud of. This makes Paulo my player of the weekend.
Roger Johnson - How this guy hasn’t made an England squad in the last twelve months is beyond me. Helping Birmingham to easily escape the drop last season, he has gone on to help the Blues achieve a reputation of being difficult to break down, especially at the new Fortress St Andrews. This weekends visitors Liverpool, akin to many other teams, simply couldn’t break through the Birmingham defence mainly due to Roger Johnson keeping Fernando Torres quiet for ninety minutes. Stellar performance from an increasingly impressive centre back.
Christopher Samba - One word comes to mind when describing this giant of a centre back, that word being versatile. When Sam Allardyce struggled for options up-front last season, the last person you’d thing he would call on was Mr Samba, but call on him he did, and didn’t he do well! Thus far this season Christopher Samba has stuck to what he knows best and this week helped his Blackburn team to steal a point from the billion dollar team, Manchester City.
Nicky Shorey - Similar to his full England debut when he kept the Brazilians at bay in a 1-1 draw, Shorey didn’t allow last seasons high flyers Tottenham a seconds peace to let their creative juices flow. From his days of great potential back at Leyton Orient he has, as everyone expected, reached the dizzy heights of premiership football. On performances like that on Saturday, nobody is remotely surprised. Let’s hope Nicky can be the player to finally challenge Ashley Cole for the England left-back spot!
Sebastian Larsson - Seb has come a long long way since his youth days at Arsenal. What started as a potential talent has finally begun to shake of that potential tag and really show what he can do with a revitalised Birmingham City team. Larsson is an important building block in the team providing the flair to go along with the solidity of other members of the team. Cameron Jerome must love having him in the squad as his balls into the box have been sublime as of late and against Liverpool there has never been a better example.
Mikel Arteta - One of the biggest downsides of last season was that Arteta didn’t take part in much of it. However, almost eleven months on the sidelines didn’t deter the boy one bit from returning with vengeance. After hitting the ground running at the fall of last season he back, willing and more than able to provide Everton with that much needed quality to help them reach the dizzy heights of high profile European football next term. The Spain set-up is the best in world football currently and Mikel is owed a chance to step into the breach and get a chance at fitting himself into their midfield alongside Xavi and Iniesta because he sure does have the quality. Everton’s biggest coup of recent time was not only signing this guy but last February attaching him to a five year contract.
Michael Essien - When a 5’ 10” holding midfielder is winning ariel battles against a 6’ 1” centre back, leading to two goals no less, you know said midfielder is definitely doing something right. Even against a West Ham side in crisis this statistic is impressive on its own merit. Everybody already knew Essien has bags of talent and that it was a shame he couldn’t represent his home nation in his home continent at the World Cup, but boy oh boy is he back with a bang. It took Essien less than two minutes to make his mark and throughout the entire season i guarantee he makes my team of the week on numerous occasions.
Matthew Etherington - Having had his ups and downs in recent years, Matty Etherington has finally found his spiritual home at The Potters. Naturally left-sided, a good quality final ball and the odd goal now and again, the past two seasons Etherington has been Mr consistent and showed this trait to great effect against Aston Villa helping them to a last gasp win giving them their first points of this campaign. Etherington set up both of Stoke’s goals in their 2-1 win giving them future impetus to get out of the relegation zone.
Asamoah Gyan - A dream start to his career in English football. On debut . There was not a lot more Asamoah Gyan could have asked for this weekend. We learnt from the world cup that he had something special but I myself questioned whether or not he could translate that into the premier league setting. With only half an hour to express himself he has already started to show that he most definitely can. A sublime ball in from Henderson was classily swept in on the volley mid-flight by Gyan. Let’s hope that this class and entertaining celebrations happen on a regular basis.
D.J. Campbell - Everybody worried that Blackpool would struggle. Not only at the back but in the goal-scoring department. Those worries have so far gone unfounded. Marlon Harewood has finally found his shooting boots after a fair few years and Luke Varney is stepping up to premiership level. In D.J. Campbell Blackpool have bought a real bargain. He appears to have learnt the ways of the premiership with very little difficulty and has bagged a goal or two along the way, with yet another buried against Newcastle.
D.J. Campbell - Everybody worried that Blackpool would struggle. Not only at the back but in the goal-scoring department. Those worries have so far gone unfounded. Marlon Harewood has finally found his shooting boots after a fair few years and Luke Varney is stepping up to premiership level. In D.J. Campbell Blackpool have bought a real bargain. He appears to have learnt the ways of the premiership with very little difficulty and has bagged a goal or two along the way, with yet another buried against Newcastle.
That was my very own team of the week circa 13th September 2010. Thanks for reading and i’ll be back this time next week with, you guessed it, those eleven players that stood on the shoulders of giants and expressed themselves more than the rest.
Keep those shin rollers in the back of the net!
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