Manchester City are represented in the latest Premier League team of the week that has been selected by BBC pundit Garth Crooks.
Actually Garth is now down as a ‘Football Analyst’ these days, a posh term for a pundit then!
The performance by Kevin de Bruyne in the three one victory over Arsenal at the weekend at the Etihad Stadium was enough to earn them a place in the side alongside the other, in the opinion of the former Spurs striker anyway, most impressive performers in the topflight over the latest weekend.
I think we’ll already know ourselves, and not just based on the latest performance, why Crooks, we’ll also not argue with it, selected de Bruyne as part of his team but explaining his choice he told the BBC.
‘Based on my TOTW selections, Kevin de Bruyne is on target to be my player of the season. We know all about his assists, but I think his ability to score goals is just as good. Quite apart from anything else, there can’t be many players in the modern game who can strike the ball so cleanly. Against Arsenal, Petr Cech made the mistake of not holding his first strike, an error compounded by his defenders giving the ball back to De Bruyne in order to give the Belgian another crack at goal. This time he didn’t make any mistake. The ball ripped past Cech and set Manchester City up for a well-deserved victory. I admit City’s second goal was offside, but I couldn’t see the Gunners getting anything out of the game. City are playing some glorious football – it must be an absolute pleasure playing for Pep Guardiola at the moment.’
It’s always good to see the club represented in this way, and well played to de Bruyne for his recognition, but the most important thing about the weekend was of course the win.
Full Team:
Nick Pope (Burnley), Steve Cook (Bournemouth), Shane Duffy (Brighton), Lewis Dunk (Brighton), Kevin de Bruyne (Manchester City), N’Golo Kante (Chelsea), Eden Hazard (Chelsea), Rajiv van La Parra (Huddersfield Town), Mohamed Salah (Liverpool), Alvaro Morata (Chelsea), Riyad Mahrez (Leicester City).
