I didn’t want to start another thread about Jermaine but I noticed the 16 page one was locked a few weeks ago. Seems a bit unfair considering the majority of our players have a thread and it’s interesting reading the views and how opinions change over the season, but I understand that a lot of shite gets spouted and the mods have no choice in some occasions.
Anyway, I thought he had a good game against Wigan. The first 10 minutes were touch and go and he looked a bit confused and his first touch let him down on a few occasions. After that he settled down and received a lot of the ball. One thing I instantly noticed was his off-ball movement and his runs compared to Kuyt; especially getting in goal scoring positions, but I guess that’s just a natural thing for Kuyt seeing as he is a forward. A great thing with Pennant on the ball on the right is that it enables Riera to drift into the box who seems pretty good with his head; similar to the way Kuyt gets himself in and around the box when Riera is on the ball on the left. It would be good to see Jermaine do the same thing regularly, although he has been improving recently.
Thought he put in some good crosses and some decent corners, although the first was a shocker – the dreaded short corner and it ended with us passing it back to the half way line. The corner in the second half was a peach and Riera should have done better to hit the target. His overall game was good – looked comfortable on the ball, good control, beat players on the inside and outside, put in decent balls and helped track back when we were defending. He is definitely another option for Rafa to use and to be fair to Pennant he has been good in his last 5 or 6 games when he has started. He managed to bag his himself goals against Newcastle and Fulham and getting a few assists against Birmingham, Crewe and Wigan.
To sum up my amateur armchair assessment of Jermaine, he was disappointing for the first half of the 06 season then started to come into his own and looked quite promising. Played well against Chelsea and Arsenal and was undeniably our best player in Athens. He had a respectable amount of assists in the end. He started the 07 season well then got injured and never really got a look-in when he returned. He’s only started about 7 games after his injury and when he has, he’s contributed. I agree that he can be a frustrating player to watch at times and that he’s had some stinkers, but then again I sometimes get frustrated with Yossi, Ryan, Dirk and Xabi.
I feel that it is too easy to criticise Pennant and that it is accepted by the majority and that people aren’t pulled up about it unlike when others are criticised. Another thing I noticed is that the “101 excuses and mitigating circumstances” handbook isn’t brought out when discussing Jermaine, although it frequently gets used when talking about other players and other issues surrounding our team.