Midfield
Trending
Picking the players to play across midfield was a much easier task. In fact, the first four names that came up made our list!
Arsenal playmaker Mesut Ozil walks into this team thanks to his record-chasing assists numbers this season. For a number of seasons, Thierry Henry’s record of 20 assists in a season seemed insurmountable. Frank Lampard and Cesc Fabregas came close but never breached the 20-mark.
Ozil has six games to get three more to make the record his. He was out of the blocks early this season, racing to 16 assists by the end of December. A slow-down of sorts coincided with Arsenal’s run of poor results but the German looks to be back to his best, even adding goals to his tally.
Leicester City’s duo of Riyad Mahrez and N’Golo Kante have been essential to the Foxes’ philosophy of winning the ball back and launching counter-attacks. Ranieri’s side have one of the lowest possession stats in the league (45% – better than only Sunderland and West Brom), which is why Kante’s league-leading 134 assists sees him in the running for the PFA Player of the award.
But it's hard to look beyond Mahrez when that award is discussed. The Algerian winger has 16 goals and 11 assists this season. Nobody else has double-digit figures for goals and assists in the Premier League. And his goals in recent 1-0 wins have made the difference in the title race.
Our fourth midfielder is one of the signings of the season. Dimitri Payet was a player who arrived at West Ham under the radar last summer. Under Slaven Bilic, the French midfielder thrived and put in performances that saw the Hammers win big away games and see them rise up the table.
Payet’s physics-defying free-kicks have become the stuff of legend and he even managed to carry that form during international duty for France. His 35-yard free-kick at Old Trafford to beat De Gea has been one of the goals of the season.
