The winners take it all
It’s Greer v Rhodes in £200m showdown
BRIGHTON boss Chris Hughton has backed veteran Gordon Greer to come in from the cold and stop Scotland team-mate Jordan Rhodes in today’s spectacular £200million shoot-out for the English Premier League.
The 35-year-old defender has not featured for the team since January and his last game was for Gordon Strachan’s men in a friendly win over Denmark at Hampden in March.
But with key centre-back Lewis Dunk suspended, Hughton has entrusted Greer with a rare start in today’s Championship showdown at the Riverside Stadium, where Middlesbrough need just a draw and Brighton a victory to land the gigantic windfall that comes with promotion to the English top flight.
Greer’s main task in partnership with Connor Goldson will be preventing hitman Rhodes from adding to his 17 goals for both Boro and Blackburn this season. But, despite his lack of game time, the manager has backed his captain to steer the club back to the Premier League for the first time since 1983.
‘Gordon’s ready, he’s our captain,’ said Hughton. ‘He has very good fitness levels and, of course, he is vastly experienced.
‘He’s missed a big chunk of it. But that’s why he trains as hard as he does. His lack of match action is a concern, but he is a player with vast experience. I have no hesitation in putting him in.’
Hughton is also hoping playmaker Anthony Knockaert can shrug off feeling like the man who binned the winning ticket after rejecting a new contract with Leicester City last summer.
The Frenchman now stands on the brink of his own great achievement having contributed four goals and three assists in his last six games. He also walked off with the Sky Bet Player of the Month award this week and the wider consensus has him as one of the finest talents outside the Premier League.
The only bump might have been the inevitable moments of reflection as something remarkable happened to his former team-mates.
‘I spoke to Riyad Mahrez this week on the phone and I talk a lot with Steve Walsh, the scout,’ said Knockaert. ‘I have great friends there. I am delighted for Riyad, for that unbelievable club, for everyone there, players like Andy King who came through the whole way with the club from League One. Brilliant. No jealousy.’
And yet the 24-year-old can be forgiven for feeling he ‘deserved’ a happier ending. He spent three eventful seasons there. In 2012-13, he was named Leicester’s Young Player of the Year but suffered famously when his last-minute penalty in the play-off semi-final against Watford was saved. The Hornets immediately went up the other end and scored the winner.
The following campaign, he was one of Leicester’s leading players as they won the Championship. But last season, during the great escape from relegation, it went off the rails. Nigel Pearson, who had signed Knockaert from Guingamp in 2012, evidently did not fancy him for the top flight.
‘I deserved better. That’s why I wanted to leave,’ said Knockaert. ‘I thought I had the quality to play. But he (Pearson) didn’t give me three or four games (in a row) to show what I can show.’
Knockaert was offered a four-year contract to stay but joined Standard Liege on a Bosman free transfer.
He added: ‘At my age, it’s important to be playing. To be honest, I thought it would still be him (Pearson) this season and I thought he wouldn’t give me my chance again.’
After an impressive first half of the season in Belgium, Brighton signed Knockaert in January. The challenge is to help one of the most impressive clubs outside the top flight take their next step. Knockaert has been at this point twice before.
‘In 2013, the play-off against Watford, the last minute was a nightmare,’ he said. ‘You can miss a penalty, that happens, but they scored just a second later. That is what hurt me. After a week I was already thinking about the next season.’
He soared back up a year later, fell out of favour in 2014-15, and now is on a mission again, propelled by the memory of his late elder brother, Steve, who died seven years ago.
‘I heard just after the first professional game in my life (for Guingamp),’ he said. ‘My father said I have to come back because my brother had a heart attack.
‘Now I try to do everything for my brother, to make him proud. He is my motivation every day.’
Boro could return to the top flight for the first time since 2009, and skipper Grant Leadbitter says it would give not only the club but the region an economic boost.
‘We certainly know what promotion means to the people of Middlesbrough,’ said Leadbitter. ‘Ben Gibson, Jonathan Woodgate and Stewart Downing are from the area and they feed stuff into the dressing room about the problems. We know what’s gone on.’