Players who have proved their critics wrong this season

• This season there have been several players who were ruled out by the critics but have proved otherwise, we look at such.

The way that football transfers operate is widely accepted. A player makes a transfer to a larger club after putting out a good performance at one, garnering notice. The same thing happens when a player doesn’t perform well, loses favor, and joins a worse team.

This season there have been several players who were ruled out by the critics but have proved otherwise, we look at such.

Eric Dier

Eric Dier in action for Bayern Munich. Photo/ beIN Sports

Eric Dier’s tenure at Tottenham came to an end with the hiring of Ange Postecoglou as manager; the defender was frozen out in north London.

During the first half of the season, Dier played just 198 minutes in the Premier League—hardly the typical lead-up to a transfer to a major European team. In January, Bayern Munich attempted Spurs to sign Dier, and they were able to arrange for the center defender to join on loan.

The 30-year-old has subsequently made seven league appearances since reuniting with Harry Kane, his former Tottenham colleague, at the Bundesliga champions.

It seems like Dier has stumbled his way to the top from the Spurs sidelines to a contender for the Champions League.

Matheus Nunes

Matheus Nunes joined Manchester City. Photo/Goal

In 2022, Wolves signed Portugal international Matheus Nunes in a club-record move from Sporting Lisbon; his arrival at Molineux was seen as a triumph. The season before, Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola had praised Nunes as one of the greatest players in the world—a high recommendation from one of the game’s greatest thinkers.

But Nunes’s season with Wolves was uneven; in 35 league games, he managed just one goal and one assist. Even with glimpses of the exceptional ball-carrying ability that convinced Wolves to shell out a lot of money for his services, everyone was still taken aback when Manchester City approached.

Guardiola paid £53 million to bring Nunes into his midfield options at the Etihad, but the Spaniard has also failed to get the best performance out of the 25-year-old regularly. Only six league games had Nunes started since joining the champions in the summer.

Kai Havertz

Not too many people were too sad to see Kai Havertz leave Chelsea during the summer. Too frequently, the German played the part of the charming fool, even if he had his moments wearing a Chelsea shirt—most famously, winning the 2021 Champions League final.

Little was surprising about his departure because he lacked a defined role and consistency. It was the destination that was surprising, though. In the first few weeks of the season, Mikel Arteta faced criticism for Arsenal’s decision to approve a £65 million move to Bringrtz across the capital.

Havertz needed some time to adjust to life in north London, and many thought Arsenal had suffered the same fate as Chelsea. A player with immense potential who eluded analysis.

Since then, Havertz has been included in Arteta’s strategy, and the 24-year-old has established himself with forward runs that opposing teams have found difficult to stop. In a scoring-rich Arsenal club, he has seven goals and three assists, dispelling some of the skepticism that preceded his arrival.

Kepa Arrizabalaga

Kepa Arrizabalaga. Photo/ Football365.

At Chelsea, Kepa Arrizabalaga was never very convincing. The five seasons Kepa spent in west London were marred by setbacks in his form and popularity, as the anticipation of his world-record price tag hung like a weight around the Spaniard’s neck.

The 29-year-old was relegated to a secondary role at Stamford Bridge following two unsatisfactory seasons with Chelsea following the signing of Edouard Mendy. Before making a brief comeback to the starting lineup last season, he played in just 11 league games throughout the 2020–21 and 2021/22 campaigns combined.

Kepa’s future is questionable, though, after Chelsea agreed to deals to recruit Djordje Petrovic and Robert Sanchez, who was essentially Brighton’s third-choice goalkeeper at the time of that transition.

Due to Thibaut Courtois’ ACL injury, Real Madrid moved quickly to recruit the Spanish goalkeeper, who chose to battle for La Liga and the Champions League at the Bernabeu rather than settle for mid-table mediocrity. He has made eighteen appearances for Carlo Ancelotti’s team in all competitions, despite his recent decline in play.