The season awards: 2016-2017 for the EPL

gerd

gerd

Retired Footballer
8 January 2002
Over the moon
KRC Genk, Spurs
Thought i might give this a try.

Team of the season: Chelsea
Player of the season: Kanté
Manager of the season: i see 3 candidates: Conte, Paul Clement or Pocchetino
Biggest disappointment (club): Manchester City
Biggest disappointment (manager): Guardiola and Mourinho
Biggest disappointment (player): Kevin De Bruyne - Pogba - Rooney
Best young players: Jordan Pickford, King (Bournemouth), Davies (Everton) & Delle Alli.
Most overachieving team: Spurs (sixth biggest budget, ended second, netto transfer budget over the last 5 seasons: 21 million pound, that is 20 times less than both Manchester clubs) and Burnley

Best players in their position:

GK: Pickford - De Gea - Schmeichel and Burnley's GK (the fact that i even remember his name is testament to how underestimated he is).
CB: Alderweireld & Vertonghen
WB's: Alonso & Moses
DMF: Kanté
Creative midfielders: Hazard - Eriksen - Coutinho - Llalana
CF: Costa & Alexis Sanchez
Wingers: Zaha - Son - Pedro

Best English player: Adam Lallana (that name! So difficult).

Most overrated player: Harry Kane

Rule that i want to change: the hands rule in the box. Less penalties for hands, but much more for contact, every contact should be a penalty.

Dirtiest foul: one in Europe: Delle Alli on Brecht De Jaegere in the Euro League.

International:

Team: Juventus, AS Monaco and Ajax
Players: Ronaldo - Mbappé - Dollberg - Bonucci and the refs in Barcelona-PSG and Real Madrid- Bayern Munchen.

Coach: Allegri - Mauricio Sarri (Napoli)- Peter Bosz (Ajax) - Leonardo Jardim (AS Monaco).


Best matches i have seen: Spurs-Chelsea at Wembley in the semi-final of the FA Cup (despite the result).

Manchester City - AS Monaco and Ajax- Lyon.
 
I think I'd agree with most of that Gerd. The keeper is Tom Heaton and I agree he is very under rated. Unlike Joe Hart who is very over rated. I hope Pickford chooses to go somewhere where he will be first choice it will be a real shame if he goes the route of someone like Asmir Begovic sitting on a bench when he could be first choice keeper at most teams outside the top six.

Can we add most over rated manager? Guardiola and Mourinho. Would love to see them manage someone like Accrington Stanley with no transfer money, a small squad and being unable to name a 'weak' team that still has 11 internationals in it.

About six weeks ago I'd have put Pulis in the mix for Manager of the Season but his team seems to have switched right off since getting to 40pts. Don't like his tactics at all in terms of entertainment but can't knock what he's done there and at Stoke previously.


Worst Manager of the season - David Moyes. From the moment he joined Sunderland he's been talking about relegation! I think he must have had the players believing it from day one as well. I always though he used to be good at Everton, a bit dour but they were a strong side and very hard to beat. I thought he'd have at least made Sunderland hard to beat but evidently not. Their tactics seemed to consist of get the ball to Defoe and hope he'll score more than we let in. I really feel for Sunderland fans, I can't remember the last time I saw an entertaining Sunderland team. They also seem to sign the most players that you've never heard of and likely never will again!



Rules to change....

Talking of fouls in the box, whatever happened to indirect free kicks in the box for obstruction? If they brought in some more indirect free kick rules inside the box like an inadvertent handball for example then maybe referees would give more fouls.


Standing in front of the ball to stop a quick free kick should be an instant yellow every time, that would soon stop it.


You can imagine FIFA in a big meeting somewhere at the end of last season

"How can we improve the game?"
"Well, there's blatant time wasting going on all the time, there's diving and cheating, there's abusing referee's, the stupid goal kick rule so keepers can waste time taking it to the opposite side to kick it out, so much we could do for the better." "Ok, let's change the kick off rule."
"Yes, let's do that, that's inspired."


And that, in a nutshell, sums up the ruling bodies of football.
 
Team of the season:
  • Chelsea - Won't go down as a memorable team but they got the most pts and that's what counts at the end of the day. Solid and efficient.
Player of the season:
  • Hazard - Take Kante out and CFC still have a chance of winning the PL. Take Hazard out and no chance.
Manager of the season: i see 3 candidates:
  1. Conte - Will have a tougher time next season with Europe but he won the PL after his tactical change and unless something extraordinary happens elsewhere, like say if WBA had finished 2nd , the winner of the PL should win it (and does unless ...it's Mancini or Pellegrini)
  2. Pochettino - To get his team to push again after last year is a testament to his man management. Has also been more flexible and less conservative as the season has progressed. Some excellent football.
  3. Howe - Has the balls to play good football at a tiny club and looks set to finish in the top half
Biggest disappointment (club):
  1. Leicester - Downed tools. Left a very sour taste
  2. Utd - Expected them to win the league or be very close to it. 66pts and cowardly dull football. No.1 if they fail to get CL via EL
  3. City - Exciting times ahead but, whilst didn't expect to win the PL this year, expected to challenge later than we did.
Biggest disappointment (manager):
  1. Mourinho - Acts like he's the manager of some minnows club, not the manager of the club with the deepest squad in the league. Didn't rotate earlier in the season and now reliant on winning a tournament he deemed beneath him and the club because he failed so hard in the PL. Dug his players out constantly. Good attackers wasted. Reliant upon finding the big man at the back post.
  2. Moyes - Walks through the door and basically relegates his side straight away. Has totally lost his fight and his players didn't show any either - coincidence?
  3. Pep - Done a lot of good but stuck with Bravo far too long which was a huge mistake. Too much rotation at the back too.
Biggest disappointment (player):
  1. Bravo - Small GKs need amazing reflexes, his has probably dipped with his age. His distribution is sublime but his actual goalkeeping has been pitiful
  2. Xhaka - Really rate him but he has been poor. Fully expect to see the real Xhaka next season. He started poor at BMG too
  3. Pogba - If he was half the price he'd have done ok. High highs, low lows, mostly average.
Best young players (U21):
  1. Dele Alli - Smells goals.
  2. Leroy Sane - Unplayable at times
  3. Tom Davies - Seems a tidy player. Honestly not seen a lot of him but most of the other names are too old now to be considered youngsters imo.
Most overachieving team:
  1. Bournemouth - Not a PL club in terms of budget, facilities etc. 2nd season in PL which is often the hardest and yet currently 10th and can finish between 8th and 11th depending on last round of results. Also try to play good football.
  2. Spurs - can reach 86 pts despite wasting most of their transfer budget on Sissoko and Janssen. Would be no.1 if not for awful european campaigns
  3. Burnley -- Difficult to watch but not unlike Bournemouth in terms of punching above their weight
Best players in their position:
TOTS:
De Gea
Alderweireld Luiz Van Dijk
Kante
Eriksen Silva
Alli
Sanchez Kane Hazard​

Others:
GK: Pickford - Lloris - Courtois - Heaton (Burnley)
CB: Azpilicueta - Vertonghen - Keane - Bailly
WB's: Rose - Alonso & Walker - Valencia
DMF: Kanté - Wanyama - Romeu - Herrera
Creative midfielders: De Bruyne - Sigurdssen - Lallana - Fabregas (what a super sub he has been)
CF: Lukaku - Zlatan - Defoe - Llorente
Wingers: Mane - Zaha - Coutinho - Pedro

Best English player:
  • Dele Alli - Excellent old fashioned no.10 / "shadow striker"
Most overrated player:
  • Costa - Touch of an elephant. Can have good games and many won't agree but I don't rate him highly
Rule that i want to change:
  • Realistic one: Player can dribble from kick-off. Want to see Messi take on a whole team!
  • Unrealistic one: Timer on scoreboard. Clock stops when play stops. Clock stops when sub made. Ridiculous and obviously open to corruption how we time games atm. Only unrealistic because the governing bodies probably like having an avenue for corruption.
Dirtiest foul:
  • Dele Alli on Brecht De Jaegere in the Euro League.
----

International:

Team:
  1. Real or Juve
  2. Real or Juve
  3. AS Monaco
Players: Messi - CRonaldo - Mbappé - Bonucci - Dybala - Thiago - Marcelo - Mertens - Dzeko

Coach: Allegri - Mauricio Sarri (Napoli)- Peter Bosz (Ajax) - Leonardo Jardim (AS Monaco).

Best matches i have seen:
  • Real 2-3 Barca - Best El Classico for a while
  • City 5-3 Monaco - High level attacking play from both teams
  • City 1-1 Liverpool - Both teams said "fuck it" and just attacked each other.
  • Lyon 3-1 Ajax (4-5) - 1st leg result is what made it a great watch
  • Chelsea 4-2 Spurs - Summed up the title race. Spurs the better football. Chelsea solid and efficient.
 
Last edited:
gerd said:
Most overrated player: Harry Kane
Click to expand...

:THINK: Curious why you think that. He's a goal machine and yet you don't see that many people say he's world class yet.
He's a better player than other big/ish strikers like Lukakau and Costa imo.
 
For me he would have been the moral golden boot even without his 7 goals this week, because he was injured twice...

Yes he is a very, very prolific goal scorer, but imo he is often too egoïstic and don't passess the ball to players who are better positioned...

I also don't see him being as good outside of England and even for another English team...

But i concede that saying he is the most overrated player is exagerated...
 
I agree with you he is on the greedy side. Most top ST are but he probably takes it a bit too far. I think he's capable of being a more rounded player and at 23/24? he has time.
To be talked about in the WC bracket he'll need to do it in europe and do a bit more for England.
 
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