End of Season Review: Best Defender

Timi Iwayemi: John Terry (CHELSEA) : The legendary Chelsea captain had another amazing season at the heart of the champions’ defence. The Chelsea defence kept 17 clean sheets and conceded only 32 goals this seasons (two league highs). Terry, the leader of this defence played every single minute of this captain and was a huge stumbling block for many of the league’s forwards. The skipper also chipped in with some vital goals from set pieces scoring 5 this season.

  Oluwamayowa Idowu: Simon Kuper recently tweeted of Rafa Benitez’ transfer misadventures and he might have a point but the Spaniard deserves credit for overseeing the transfer of Cesar Azpilicueta to Chelsea during his London gap year. The full back has been one of the most consistent players in the league in that time, despite being played out of position. A worthy Premier League Champion.

Laurent Koscielny comes a close 2nd- one of the best centre backs in the world. He’s one of the quickest defenders around, tidy in possession and has gotten rid of the odd moments of rash defending that detracted from his greatness. His absence is one of the explanations of Arsenal’s patchy form in the first half of the season and his subsequent resurrection aided their second half purple patch.

Michael Famoroti: The fantastic four. Ivanovic, Cahill, Terry and Cesar “Dave” Azpilicueta. As a unit they were nearly impenetrable (We will forgive that calamitous New Year’s Day performance). They have weak spots but all compensate for each other so well. The most amazing thing is that Ivanovic is not a natural right back and “Dave” isn’t a natural left-back. A lot of comparisons have been made between 04/05 Chelsea and this year’s edition and this back 4 have a serious claim to be as good, if not better than their previous incarnates.

Somto Mbah: Laurent Koscielny (ARSENAL)

For a team like Arsenal fond of pushing so many men forward, it would surprise you what the statistics say about Koscielny. His concentration meant he averaged more interceptions per game (3.66) than any other PL defender while also making a joint league-leading low defensive errors per game(0.08) for all defenders who played more than 20 games. His pace and timing of the tackle are dreams of every midfielder, and his willingness to push forward to win the ball is akin to Manuel Neuer’s redefinition of goalkeeping.

To add icing on the cake, he scores quite a number of goals for a defender. He has grown from the brash defender who got a red card on his debut for Arsenal against Liverpool to a match decider for Arsenal on any given weekend.

Dami Etomi:  John Terry. Who would have thought that three years after being written off by Andre Villas Boas and Rafa Benitez, John Terry would win the premier league at the age of 34 without missing a single minute of PL action?

John Terry has epitomized everything about this Chelsea team and in my opinion is one of the finest defenders we will ever see. He makes playing alongside him look effortlessly easy and is rarely ever caught out of position. His form has earned him yet another contract extension and at this rate, who will argue against him playing for another three years?