Football365
·2 October 2023
Football365
·2 October 2023
It was a miserable Saturday for Lewis Dunk, Jason Steele and Diogo Jota.
More than half of the Premier League’s worst XI is made up of Brighton bunglers, while Diogo Jota’s kamikaze cameo earns the Liverpool forward the worst score of the weekend.
Here is the worst XI, according to WhoScored ratings…
Goalkeeper: Jason Steele 5.39 Four stoppers earned sub-six scores this weekend, including Ederson, Jordan Pickford and Mark Flekken. But Steele gets the gloves after conceding six goals from an xG of 1.96. Still, the Brighton keeper finished with a 100 per cent passing accuracy, and that’s what goalkeeping is all about these days, isn’t it?
Right-back: Max Aarons: 5.04 Aarons was the worst of a bad lot when it comes to Premier League right-backs this weekend. Joel Veltman, Ashley Young, Connor Roberts and wing-back Jayden Bogle all failed to achieve a 6/10, but Aarons only just scraped a five after a rough afternoon against Arsenal, which included a daft tackle to give the Gunners their second penalty.
Centre-back: Lewis Dunk – 5.57 An all-Brighton centre-back partnership after Ollie Watkins led the Seagulls a merry dance at Villa Park on Saturday lunchtime. They didn’t get much protection from the wee boys in front of them but Dunk chose a bad afternoon to have a stinker with Gareth Southgate watching on.
Centre-back: Adam Webster – 5.57 Webster was equally poor, seemingly off the pace all afternoon. The only time he got close enough to Watkins was when he deflected in the Villa striker’s hat-trick goal.
Left-back: Pervis Estupinan – 5.41 Estupinan was arguably the worst of the lot for Brighton, at least before he was hooked at half-time after scoring an own goal while chasing Villa shadows. Charlie Taylor, Moussa Niakhate and Aaron Hickey all had miserable weekends too but Estupinan absolutely stank out Villa Park.
Centre-midfield: Curtis Jones – 5.24 Gary Neville might not have agreed with Jones’ first-half red card at Tottenham but it didn’t matter that the Liverpool midfielder had no intention of trying to ‘do’ Yves Bissouma. No-one thought he had. But it was still arguably the least controversial of the decisions on a frustrating evening for Liverpool.
Centre-midfield: James McAtee – 5.75 The Sheffield United midfielder set the tone for his afternoon when he lost the ball on his goalline, but West Ham wasted the early opportunity handed to them. It got little better for McAtee, who gave the ball away 14 times in total from 39 touches before being hooked with 20 minutes to go.
Right-wing: Justin Kluivert 5.78 The Bournemouth winger can alternate flanks with Mitoma since both play on the left for their clubs, with each recording the same miserable score. Kluivert managed only 13 touches and seven passes in an hour on the pitch against Arsenal.
Left-wing: Kaoru Mitoma – 5.78 Mitoma gave Villa the ball 20 times on Saturday, with five of his seven dribble attempts halted by the hosts. The winger also lost all but three of his 15 duels. A special mention also for Danny Welbeck who earned an even lower score (5.75) but, unlike Roberto De Zerbi, we won’t shoehorn the forward into an attacking midfield position.
Centre-forward: Evan Ferguson – 5.71 It wasn’t until the commentator mentioned Ferguson’s name just before half-time at Villa Park that we realised he was playing for Brighton. He was given hardly any longer to make an impression since he was replaced at the break having been left stranded up front by his calamitous team-mates and unable to shake off Ezri Konsa and Pau Torres.
Centre-forward: Diogo Jota – 4.76 A slow handclap for Jota, who recorded the worst score of this and most weeks by coming on at half-time before collecting two bookings, the second especially daft, in 24 minutes to leave Liverpool two men light. Jota was obviously desperate to get involved since, in his brief time on the pitch, he conceded four fouls while losing three of his 11 duels.