Fabio Capello may have got one of his controversial team selections spectacularly wrong in the World Cup so far - step forward Robert Green - but he certainly made the correct choice when it came to deciding upon Wayne Rooney's strike partner.The performance of much-criticised Emile Heskey was one of the few plusses for England in their opening group draw with the USA on Saturday and his display was enough to earn him a place in the first FanHouse World Cup Team of the Week.
FanHouse experts pooled their views to come up with the best XI from the opening five days of the 2010 tournament and the list provides an interesting blend of global icons, emerging stars and players from unfancied nations.
Few players entered the tournament with a bigger reputation than Argentina's Lionel Messi and he did not disappoint with his performance in the victory over Nigeria and partners Heskey in our TOTW.
Team-mate Gabriel Heinze made sure that Argentina are the only nation with two representatives in the first TOTW with his goal deciding that game. Heinze is a player who hardly set the Premier League alight but it still well worthy of his place on the world stage - a description that could be applied to Robinho whose performance in Brazil's victory over North Korea last night earns him a call-up.
There is a healthy representation from the EPL in the side, but possibly not from the clubs and nations we might have expected.
Tim Howard's display in that famous American draw with England earns him the goalkeeping spot while the two central defensive places go to Manchester City's Kolo Toure of the Ivory Coast, who was immense in his country's stalemate against Portugal, and Blackburn's Ryan Nelsen who was the pick of the Kiwi crop as his country earned their first ever World Cup point.
Meanwhile, Bolton's Chung-Yong Lee, who had a quietly impressive season with Owen Coyle's team, was one of the stars of South Korea's impressive opening victory against disappointing Greece.
World Cups are also about new players coming onto the global stage and South Africa's winger Siphiwe Tshabalala earned his little place in football history by scoring the tournament's opening goal in the host nation's draw with Mexico. Germany's Mesut Ozil was another player who may not have been universally known before the competition began but the Werder Bremen midfielder's performance in his country's demolition of Australia suggests he will be before the month is complete.
Finally, it is a safe wager that few football fans knew the name of Kwang-Chon Ri before last week but the North Korea right-back did enough in his team's memorable, narrow defeat to Brazil last night to earn his call-up to TOTW.
Goalkeeper: Tim Howard (USA) - 8
Right-back: Kwang-Chon Ri (North Korea) - 8
Centre-back: Kolo Toure (Ivory Coast) - 8
Centre-back: Ryan Nelsen (New Zealand) - 8
Left-back: Gabriel Heinze (Argentina) - 9
Right midfield: Robinho (Brazil) - 8
Centre midfield: Mesut Ozil (Germany) - 9
Centre midfield: Chung-Yong Lee (South Korea) - 9
Left Midfield: Siphiwe Tshabalala (South Africa) - 9
Striker: Emile Heskey (England) - 9
Striker: Lionel Messi (Argentina) - 9
Comments (Page 1 of 1)
messi up front with............Emile Heskey!!!!
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahhaahahahhah.....brilliant!!!!!!!
Carling OPTA Stats – Press Release
In an exciting new development from football statistics giants Carling OPTA, the categories for recognising excellence in the beautiful game’s top strikers have been restructured. In an effort to reflect the current wisdom put forward primarily by TV and newspaper soccer journalists, strikers will no longer be judged by the old, almost universally ridiculed measures of ‘goal assists’, ‘shots on target’ and ‘goals scored’.
In their place the Carling OPTA team have introduced two new main categories of ‘making space’ and ‘making other players play well’.
In the first category (space created) Carling have revealed that England’s Emile Heskey is the only player currently on the world stage to have achieved the status of ‘lots’.
In the second category (making other players play well) Heskey was equally supreme, a spokesman for OPTA said ‘It’s unbelievable, players all around him consistently look world class – in every match of Emile’s that we studied he made it seem that he was the worst player on the pitch – quite remarkable’
Interestingly, to underline his domination of the world game, Heskey was also unrivalled in three other sub-categories being trialled by OPTA, namely – ‘being mindlessly offside’, ’pointless flick-ons to the opposing keeper’ and ‘getting up from the ground really slowly’.