If certain publications are to be believed, West Ham and Manuel Pellegrini are thought to be interested in adding Danny Drinkwater to the Iron ranks. Many eyebrows were raised when Drinkwater moved from Leicester to Chelsea as everyone knew he wasn’t going to get played on a regular basis. Everyone apart from Drinkwater, it would seem. That’s not to say there isn’t a good player in there. His partnership with N’golo Kante when Leicester won the Premier League was nothing short of formidable and if he can recreate some of that form in East London, West Ham could have a player on their hands.
Player Profile
There’s not too much which can be taken from this as he only featured for Antonio Conte’s side sporadically last season. It is worth noting that Drinkwater was injured for some of the campaign, as well. That being said, naturally, there are question marks about how much Drinkwater would cost. He moved to Stamford Bridge for a cool £35,000,000 last season and Chelsea will be keen to recuperate as much as that as possible. £20,000,000 is the fee being mentioned in places. For me, that’s too much. Regardless, I’m not pulling the purse strings at the London Stadium, so that’s not really my problem. A valid question, though, is how does he stack up in comparison to West Ham’s current midfielders? Let’s take a look.
Comparison
It was only fair to break the stats down as per ninety-minutes as Drinkwater didn’t play anywhere near the same level of football as the four he’s up against. Before we begin, I’ve no idea why Obiang hasn’t got a picture, it’s not my fault. Moving swiftly on… We’ll keep it nice and simple and run through each of the individual stats. Seem simple enough? Cracking, let’s get to it.
Interestingly, Wilshere and Drinkwater both have identical passing accuracies which could be attributed to one of two things. Number one, they’re actually better passers than the others OR, the movement was better from Chelsea and Arsenal players. I know which one I reckon. Tackles won is eye-opening as I wasn’t expecting Drinkwater to have won more tackles than Noble. I thought maybe it could be to do with the fact that Noble gives away a boatload of fouls, but the stat at the bottom puts that theory to bed.
While Drinkwater might a fair bit behind Obiang when it comes to tackles won, he’s lightyears ahead when it comes to chances created. No surprises with Wilshere top of the class on this one. Fouls committed tells me that Drinkwater isn’t fast enough to cope with the pace of the Premier League, but when you think of how successful he was at Leicester, he must be!
Conclusion
Dependant on what formation Pellegrini settles on, Drinkwater could be a fantastic signing or a mediocre one. A lot of that also hinders on how Wilshere is going to be used. Then again, the ex-Arsenal man is bound to get injured in the next few weeks so Drinkwater will be a shoe in! If Pellegrini goes for three in the middle, Drinkwater complements Noble and Obiang wonderfully well. However, where does Felipe Anderson then fit in? It’s all a bit confusing, isn’t it? Either way, one thing is for sure, if Drinkwater ends up a West Ham player, he’s surely got to have a more productive season than the one he had last year?
Until the next time.
