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The End of Season Awards are a somewhat serious, somewhat tongue-in-cheek affair in summary of the best and worst of the Premier League. It’s been an interesting if not spectacular season, so here’s the best and worst.
Highlight of the season
Aston Villa fans stand to applaud Stan Petrov in the 19th minute of every single game
I could give this to a goal and some moment of drama, but this is by far the highlight of the season. This was a reaction from the Villa fans to the tragic news that their inspirational captain Stiliyan Petrov had been diagnosed with leukaemia. Petrov had remained at Villa when all of their other star players had left and had always been passionate about his love of the club and the fans. They responded by standing to applaud and cheer his name in the 19th minute, his squad number, of every single game of the season. Always a touching and heartfelt moment, it shows that football and football fans aren’t all bad. The Villa fans recognised a strong and inspirational man and saluted him in the best way a footballer can be. It was impressive that they did so in every game, never forgetting to and never forgetting him.
Low-light of the season
Horrendous ‘tackling’
The rise of awful ‘tackling’ has been a real concern this season. It’s all well and good whinging about diving or waving fake yellow cards, and both of them are annoying, but this is downright dangerous. We’ve had McManaman on Haidara, Aguero on Luiz, Torres on Aguero, Gardner on Adam, Ivanovic on Kolarov etc, etc, etc. Lots of excuses get wheeled out, mostly about the increased pace of the game, but the truth is, players aren’t taught to tackle properly and go in to tackles wanting to avoid hurting themselves, even if it means hurting the other player. It looks horrendous, it puts other professionals at risk and it also means your team is going to be down to 10 men. It needs to be eradicated.
Goal of the Season
Robin van Persie vs Aston Villa
The goal that defined the season was also a magisterial piece of technical brilliance. Wayne Rooney picked the ball up on the halfway line, looked up to see van Persie peeling around the Villa defence and timed the release of his pass to perfection. It dropped out of the sky just as van Persie arrived at the edge of the box and he volleyed it left footed straight out of the air in to the corner of the net. The ball went about 60 yards without touching the ground. It showed how United had gradually grown to correctly utilise van Persie. Early in the season, Ferguson had complained that van Persie’s various canny runs weren’t being picked out, funny to think now but there was worry that he couldn’t mesh in. But, as they learned to feed him, he started to score a stack of goals and they charged away with the league title. In some ways it was almost symbolic, Rooney passing the ball to van Persie to get the glory, just as he has passed him the torch this season. It told a story and was technically sublime.
MVP of the Season
Cristian Benteke – Aston Villa
Yes, he’s not Bale, van Persie or Mata but Benteke is the very definition of MVP – most valuable player. Without him, it’s quite simple; Villa would have been relegated. He took a while to settle in to the Premier League in a struggling Villa side which in 2012 looked like certainties to go down. The nadir of the 8-0 smashing they took at Stamford Bridge seemed to be the beginning of the end. Benteke only scored 5 times in the early going when they were in that mess. In 2013, he scored 14 goals, including multiple match winning strikes, which kept Villa up. Even despite all these goals, they only just stayed up. He has brought a renewed vigour to Gabby Agbonlahor and tactical direction to a raw and young Villa side.
If you look at his rivals; Spurs wouldn’t have been so close to the top four and maybe would have finished behind Everton without Bale; Man United would possibly have won the league, although less easily without van Persie; Chelsea would been more invovled in the top four scrap without Mata and possibly might have missed it but it’s unlikely. Without Benteke, Villa would be in the Championship next season and ultimately it’s far more important to them to stay in the league than minor positional adjustments further up the table.
Signing of the season
Michu – Swansea
There have been some excellent signings this year; Van Persie, Benteke, Hazard, Vertonghen, Lukaku, Coutinho, Mirallas, etc, but Michu wins hands down. He wins because he was cheap, unknown and because he scored Swansea to mid table and a first ever major trophy. Costing just £2m from Rayo Vallecano, Michu’s arrival was met with only a small murmur amongst football artisans who were aware of his goal scoring exploits. He proceeded to immediately settle in, scoring twice on debut, the first of over 20 this year. He has achieved this playing either just behind the striker or as the main striker himself. His early season goals helped the rookie Michael Laudrup to find his feet out of the spotlight and the team played with freedom and vibrancy on their way to lifting the League Cup. Spectacular value, spectacular output.
Underachievers of the Season
The Toon finished 5th last season, this season they finished 16th. This pattern will be familiar to Newcastle fans who have witnessed many false dawns over the years. The interesting thing with Newcastle, is that they’ve gradually gotten worse as the season went on. They were wobbling but a reasonable distance from the drop zone when they went on their January French signing splurge but they didn’t settle. Last year’s star men, Cisse, Cabaye, Tiote and Coloccini all failed to perform at anything appraoching the levels they achieved in 2011/12. Alan Pardew is in danger of finding that his 7 year contract is only good on paper after some questionable selection decisions and tactical incoherence. It’s all well and good scouting players but if you don’t have a plan for how they will fit in together it’s a waste of time. They foisted all these players in together and it didn’t work.
Lucky Escape of the Season
Stoke City avoid relegation
Only QPR and Stoke scored less than 40 goals this season, and look what happened to QPR. Stoke managed a measly 34 goals, less than one per game, and only a few less than Robin van Persie. Their 13th place is entirely deceptive, the result of some good early season defensive displays and their usual home advantage. The 42 points they gathered would have them in or around the drop zone most seasons. Pulis has got around this amount of points every season and is showing no signs of progressing the team. In fact, it’s the opposite. He is now so entrenched in his style and so determined to prove that it works that he won’t countenance change. At times they played with 4 full backs to stop the opposition. Their supposed main passer, Charlie Adam, averaged around 70% pass completion. They keep signing the same types of players and are twisting around in infinite purgatory, never to see the top 10 again without a complete rethink, possibly to see the bottom three next year.
