MY PREMIER LEAGUE TEAM OF THE YEAR
will be in the PFA team of the Year. But who else will join them? I have chosen this 11, though there is no place for my Young Player of the Year, Leroy Sane.
It’s an old-fashioned, British 4-4-2 but I’d guarantee you’d enjoy watching this team!
GOALKEEPER
DAVID DE GEA (Man Utd) He is the best in the world at the minute and I reckon he’ll be a universal choice for this position. The progress he has made since coming to England in 2011 is extraordinary. You can’t believe he is the same player who looked so vulnerable back then and he beats City’s Ederson.
BACK FOUR
KYLE WALKER (Man City) NICOLAS OTAMENDI (Man City) HARRY MAGUIRE (Leicester City) ASHLEY YOUNG (Man Utd) This was probably the hardest section to pick. If Vincent Kompany and Virgil van Dijk had enjoyed uninterrupted seasons, they would have been certainties. I was going to include them but the more I thought about it, the less I could justify it.
Jan Vertonghen was another with outstanding claims but, in the end, Otamendi and Maguire get the nod.
I singled out Maguire in my first column for Sportsmail in November and he’s only enhanced his reputation since. Otamendi, meanwhile, has come on so much under Pep Guardiola.
While Walker is an obvious choice on the right, some of you will be surprised by Ashley Young but, right now, he is the best left back in the country and he will get votes because of his form. He’s been very solid.
Would I pick this as the best back four in the league? Probably not. But they are the four players who deserve the recognition for the seasons they have had.
MIDFIELD FOUR
MOHAMED SALAH (Liverpool) KEVIN DE BRUYNE (Man City) DAVID SILVA (Man City) EDEN HAZARD (Chelsea) I’ve made my thoughts on Salah and De Bruyne pretty clear but I have to include Silva and Hazard ahead of Sane in this midfield because their form has been outrageous. Silva is one of the greatest foreign players we have ever seen in England, while Hazard has blown me away at times.
FRONT TWO
HARRY KANE (Tottenham) SERGIO AGUERO (Man City) It has been a long wait but, finally, this will be the year Aguero gets into the PFA team.
You wonder how someone who has scored more than 200 goals for his club has never had that honour but, surely, Aguero has done enough for selection.
As for Kane, I love watching him play, I love seeing the joy he gets every time he scores.
In a normal year, he would be a leading candidate for the main award but this season has not been normal. This has been the season of De Bruyne and, most of all, Salah.