Declan Rice can hold his head up high despite another Premier League defeat for Manuel Pellegrini’s Hammers at the London Stadium.
You have to feel for Declan Rice.
Time and again, the 20-year-old academy graduate is the best player on the pitch in claret and blue, only to be let down badly by his own maddening team-mates.
Rice was the only player worthy of the West Ham United shirt in that home humping at Tottenham Hotspur last month and, when another North London giant came to town on Monday night, the England international could be forgiven for looking around at Felipe Anderson, at Arthur Masuaku, and wondering whether he has already left this hodgepodge team behind.
The all-knowing Twitterati might have been queuing up to label England’s next great defensive midfielder as nothing more than an over-hyped ‘fraud’ when Gabriel Martinelli drifted in behind him to spark Arsenal’s dramatic comeback win at the London Stadium.
But, for all of those whose knowledge of the game is derived from two-minute highlight packages and out-of-context vines, the stats should make for interesting reading.
Rice produced five tackles and three interceptions against Arsenal while completing 93 per cent of his passes. And, no, they didn’t all go sideways either. There was the glorious touch and pass which led directly to Angelo Ogbonna’s 38th-minute opener and, while he failed to stop Arsenal’s crucial leveller after the interval, it was he who broke up countless Gunners’ counter-attacks earlier on in the game.
Rice can at least hold his head up high today after another second-half collapse from Manuel Pellegrini’s brittle-boned Hammers. In truth, he is one of the few.
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