Eden Hazard, my kingdom for a turn
There were a lot of takeaways from Chelsea’s FA Cup win against Manchester United on Monday night. Ander Herrera is soccer’s most odious 12-year-old; Phil Jones’ face; Paul Pogba needs something interesting to do; Chelsea are really, really good; Diego Costa is soccer’s most odious 58-year-old; etc. But the best takeaway was that to watch Eden Hazard play is a pleasure the likes of which English soccer knows too few.
There’s nothing like seeing a team kick 18 shades of crap out of a player to appreciate his brilliance. And so it was with Hazard on Monday night, when Jose Mourinho, who knows the Belgian well, sent his team, and Jones in particular, out with very specific instructions to foul Hazard each and every chance they got, the foulier the better.
The tactic was widely ridiculed, another example of Mourinho’s arch-awfulness. Let the players play, Jose, put Phil Jones away. But none of that acknowledges the ways kicking someone really hard in the legs makes them play better. Imagine what you could achieve if Phil Jones was gurning sweatily behind you for 90 minutes.
Hazard, though. A dream. For all United’s 12th century defending, he still won Chelsea the match. There have been few clearer turning points in any game I’ve watched this season than Hazard’s gorgeous turn away from Chris Smalling in the 16th minute. United were the better team until then, even with their hobbled attack, pressing the Blues deep in their own half, forcing them out of their rhythm.
Did Smalling dive in a little? Maybe, but then why wouldn’t he? Some risks are worth taking, and some touches are worth taking five minute breaks to think about.
It was also Hazard who gave Chelsea what proved to be a telling one-man advantage, drawing the foul that got Herrera sent off for a second yellow at the end of the first half. It was soft probably, but nowhere near as soft as Herrera’s face is punchable, so I guess there’s a certain kind of cosmic justice in that.
Hazard’s been excellent all season of course, but Chelsea’s success has been so thoroughly team-oriented, the moments in which he has been, unequivocally, the main man have been sparser than you might have thought. But then that’s always sort of been the way with Hazard.
This season is either the best or second best of his career, depending on how you feel about his 2014-15 campaign. He managed 14 goals and 9 assists in the league then. So far this season he’s got 11 and four. Those are good numbers, certainly, but they’re not great numbers. That’s fewer combined goals and assists than Romelu Lukaku, Harry Kane, Alexis Sanchez, Diego Costa, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Jermain Defoe, Dele Alli, Sadio Mane and Gylfi Sigurdsson. Are any of these players better than the Belgian?
There’s a million other things Hazard does, of course. The main one is dribble. He averages almost twice as many successful dribbles a game as any of those other guys, per WhoScored, and his success rate is staggering given he’s quite publicly his team’s primary creative outlet. But it’s still perhaps something of a curiosity Hazard doesn’t score more, or assist more, especially with such a prolific striker playing alongside him.
Not curious in that it’s a flaw; curious in that there’s no elite player quite like him, one who does so much damage with such little traditional statistical output. Because there’s no debate about Hazard, no one (idiots notwithstanding) questions he’s among the very, very best in the world.
That’s kind of an amazing thing in itself. His Player of the Year award in 2014-15 was the first for an out-and-out attacking player who had scored fewer than 20 goals in all competitions since Freddie Ljungberg in 2001-02. There’s a ways to go — and his teammate, N’Golo Kante, is perhaps the frontrunner for the prize — but Hazard is in contention to repeat that feat this season.
There is of course the small matter of his 2015-16 season to contend with, when Hazard was awful by any reasonable, or even unreasonable, metric. But in hindsight that year is best explained by what almost certainly happened, which is that Hazard decided not to try. Why he did that is up for debate, though I imagine it would be a stupid debate, and the answer to that question might lead a certain kind of fan to question his mental suitability for the truly big time. But also: shut up.
And more importantly: that turn. It was everything you ever needed to know about Hazard all at once. Smalling one way, Eden the other. An entire game plan gone in a single touch. There’s just nothing to be done about a touch that good, at a speed that fast, in a game that intense. Nothing at all, and thank goodness for that.
Weekly Awards
The Alan Pardew Award for Under-The-Radar Failure: Manchester City
As the world watched Barcelona’s impossible comeback against Paris Saint-Germain last Wednesday, Manchester City hosted Stoke at the Etihad. There were a lot of reasons not to pay attention to the match, not least that nothing happened. City managed only a single shot on target, despite seeing over 65 percent of the ball. But the points they dropped could be significant. The Citizens have been playing well recently — they’re unbeaten in 11 matches in all competitions since their Jan. 15 thrashing away at Everton — but still find themselves in the thick of the race for the top four. Liverpool will now overtake City if they beat them at the Etihad this weekend.
The Yakubu Aiyegbeni Award for Misses: Wayne Routledge
Swansea have been on the rise in recent months, dragging themselves out of the relegation zone after winning five of their eight league matches in 2017 leading into Sunday’s visit to even-more-relegation-threatened Hull. The Tigers won 2-1 thanks to two second half Oumar Niasse goals to pull within three points of the Swans, a sobering reminder that there’s plenty left to play for this season. The reminder must have been extra sobering for Wayne Routledge, who missed a doozy of a chance to swing the result Swansea’s way.
The Sir Alex Ferguson Award for Unconvincing Wins: Liverpool
Winning while playing badly is the sign of champions, they say. Except not for Liverpool, apparently, for whom winning while playing badly is a sign they still haven’t figured out how to be even minimally competent against any side in the bottom half of the table. Burnley are a difficult team to play against, I guess, but they’ve also picked up a grand total of two away points all season, and they still managed to push the Reds to their very limit. Emre Can’s winner was not the sort of goal Jurgen Klopp will want his side to have to rely on against the league’s lesser lights going forward. He better figure something out quick; Liverpool’s last game against a fellow top six side is this weekend against Manchester City.
The Jens Voigt Award for Mental Toughness: Bournemouth
Boy did Bournemouth need a win. The Cherries hadn’t won a match since December before facing West Ham at the weekend, and a win is what they got, courtesy of a Josh King hat-trick. Not, however, before he missed a penalty to give his side the lead, and also not before he let his teammate, Benik Afobe, miss another penalty, and double also not before overcoming a one-goal deficit, and triple also not before surrendering a one-goal lead, but just about before the final whistle, which I guess is all that really matters under the circumstances. That should do it for Eddie Howe’s side. They’re up to 30 points now, six clear of the drop zone, and finally playing with a little confidence. Tyrone Mings didn’t die for nothing.
The Luis Suarez Award for Contract Negotiation: Romelu Lukaku
Everton were excellent against West Brom on Saturday, dominating their somewhat lethargic visitors on the way to a 3-0 win. Romelu Lukaku stood once more, scoring one and providing an assist to Morgan Schneiderlin for the goal that put the result beyond any reasonable doubt. The Belgian’s performance raised familiar questions about his future at Goodison Park. The Toffees have a big, fat, five-year, £100,000-plus-a-week contract on the table, but Lukaku has reached a point now where he can probably aspire to more than the Europa League. That’s harsh on Everton, who have taken big strides under Ronald Koeman this season, but there a just too many bigger fish in this particular pond, and Lukaku is doing an excellent job of getting their attention.