With the candidates for PFA Player of the Year having been announced, Leicester City’s Riyad Mahrez is understandably one of those most hotly tipped to claim the award later this month.
The Algerian winger has dazzled at times this season, scoring 16 goals and providing 11 assists in the Foxes’ remarkable charge towards what is seemingly an inevitable Premier League triumph—barring a late Tottenham miracle.
With that in mind, we ask: Has Riyad Mahrez been the best player in the Premier League this season?
Leicester have three worthy nominations to stake a claim for the Player of the Year award. N’Golo Kante has been a revelation, Jamie Vardy a sensation but the foundation for their title run has been Riyad Mahrez.
While this humble writer can accept the award is for the best player, rather than a player from the best team, it’s difficult to look past one of the Foxes stars.
And Sunday was a prime example of why. For their opening goal, Mahrez started the counter attack, Kante ran at the West Ham defence before Vardy finished with aplomb. That goal was the perfect manifestation of Leicester’s success this term and Mahrez has been at the heart of it.
The Algerian is the second-most prolific dribbler in the league, has the joint-second most assists and is the fifth-highest scorer in the league.
Jamie Vardy ✅
— Leicester City (@LCFC) April 13, 2016
Riyad Mahrez ✅
N'Golo Kanté ✅@PFA Players' Player of the Year nominees - https://t.co/Ek8OmYAXwP
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And what those numbers indicate is a complete attacker – he has been almost impossible to stop, operating on the right of a 4-4-2 and terrorising defenders on the counter attack.
Yes, Vardy has enjoyed an incredible campaign, but he has struggled since his record-breaking form earlier in the season. The England striker has twice gone six games without a goal and when he wasn’t scoring, Mahrez was.
In fact, during those droughts he earned the Foxes nine points and in total, of their 73 points, 30 have come directly from Mahrez – that’s difficult to argue with. But it’s not just the numbers. His ability to bounce back from disappointing moments adds extra impress to the carving of his name on the trophy.
Two penalty failures, first in the stalemate with Bournemouth and then in the draw with Aston Villa, could have deterred most but after sitting out a loss at Tottenham, he came back with three assists and a goal.
It’s this attitude that sets him apart from the rest and has saw him harness the obvious talent shown last season into a cold consistency that has alleviated the pressure on his team. In terms of individual impact, no-one has been more vital and that’s why Mahrez is the player of the season. It’s been his year.
There’s no question Riyad Mahrez would be a popular winner of the Player of the Year award – but his fantastic contribution to Leicester’s campaign masks his lack of productivity when it’s really mattered.
The Algerian magician is the favourite to land England’s top individual honour and, despite what will be one of the most even contests in years, if crowned it will be understandable.
Ignoring N’Golo Kante – who aside from the fact you could make a separate argument for why he deserves the honour, has only four assists and one goal – Mahrez tops the rest of the five nominees in most categories.
When you accumulate all stats, the 25-year-old, alongside team-mate Jamie Vardy, has the joint most goals and assists (27 – 16 goals, 11 assists), directly contributing to 46 per cent of the Foxes’ league goals. He also scores or lays on a goal more often – one every 100 minutes.
Yet Mahrez’s record in 2016 is actually pretty poor. He has just three goals this year despite more appearances since January than Vardy, Mesut Ozil, Dmitri Payet and Harry Kane. Kane tops the goalscoring charts with 22 and has 11 in 14 games since January.
That’s hugely impressive considering, at 22, he’s the youngest candidate and has stormed into contention following a stuttering start while also having to rid himself of the tag of being a one-season wonder.
In this same period, Vardy has seven goals in 15, Payet four in 13 and even Ozil, who has the least of all, with six, has found the net the same amount of times as Mahrez, despite four less appearances.
In the 109 days of 2016 so far, Mahrez has added four assists, one more than Vardy and one less than Payet. Even defensive midfielder Kante has two.
This equates to Mahrez being the fourth-most effective during what the critics call the business end of the season. His relatively dire 2016 form, during Leicester’s most testing period, is justification enough for him not to simply be handed it.
After all, it’s called the Player of the Year award, not the ‘Best Player before Christmas’ award
