Will Jack Rodwell’s injuries ruin his career?

Jack Rodwell has picked up another injury in Manchester City’s victory over Aston Villa and things just keep going from bad to worse for him.

Rodwell signed for City in the summer for £12 million with it potentially rising to £17 million and he just has not been able to prove himself on the pitch and this partly down to the fact that he may not quite be good enough for a team challenging for the title and partly down to the fact that he cannot stay fit. It should not be that surprising that he has been getting injured as he spent a lot of time in the treatement room at his former club Everton.

He is still only 21 and I personally hope he does get over these injury problems because he can become one of the best players in the Premier Leaguen either as a holding midfielder or a centre back and will surely add to his two England caps which he has already won. It is sad to see a player with such potential struggling with injuries but a lot of players have came through these bad injury spells in the past and have gone onto have successful careers. The most noticeable being Ryan Giggs at Manchester United, who struggled a little early on his career with injuries and is now going to play in his 1000th career game.

Rodwell though does need to get it right next season or he may not have the career that everyone expected of him and it would be yet another player that could not live up to their potential because of injuries.

Ten years at Everton for David Moyes

David Moyes has reached a landmark that not many others do in modern day football and he deserves every bit of praise that he receives.

For 10 years he has been at Everton and has taken them to the FA Cup final and also to Champions League qualification. Who could have imagined this when he first took charge? Especially when at times in his reign he has been given very little money and had to replace players with cheaper options who he has made into very good Premier League players. Tim Cahill is one of these who owes his Premier League career to Moyes and he has served club and manager brilliantly. At the time of his signing a lot of clubs were looking at him but Moyes took a chance on him and he has repaid the faith with eight years loyal service and scoring many important goals.

Moyes became Everton manager on the 14th March 2002

Sometimes in football the stats do lie though and I believe the Scottish manager has been overlooked for arguably bigger jobs because of his win percentage which is surprisingly only 41.74%. But during this time he has got Everton into Europe on four occasions and in the last two seasons came very close to getting the team there again. But his real skill is in the transfer market, yes he hasn’t got them all right but nobody ever will, just looking at the players he has bought, when he signed them they were not necessarily household names but after a season or two they were considered some of the best in the league. Mikel Arteta is one of these who not many had heard of but he was vital in the way the team played and this led to speculation that he could leave the club which he eventually did when he joined Arsenal. Steven Pienaar is another great example of this.

He also doesn’t mind giving players a chance for example he signed Joleon Lescott and in my opinion he would not be at Manchester City if it wasn’t for the Everton manager because he took a chance on him even though he had never played a Premier League game. Leighton Baines is another, as well as Phil Jagielka. The lists just go on for him and his success far out way his disappointments in the transfer marker, even the experienced players he has brought in have made a positive impact, a lot of people may not have thought the Phil Neville signing was going to be good but his versatility has proved vital over the years and Tim Howard who was deemed a failure in the Premier League but was given another shot and he is arguably one of the best keepers in the league.

Finally, Moyes does not only rely on transfers, he is very good with the youth team, when they bring a player through he treats them right and does not let the spotlight get on them too much. When Wayne Rooney burst onto the scene it would have been easy for the pressure to get to him but Moyes didn’t allow that and I hope that Rooney realises one day how much Moyes did for him. You can add Jack Rodwell and Ross Barkley to that list as well.

It is remarkable looking back at his Everton career because there are so many positives in everything he has done but how different it could have been if he got sacked after finishing 2003-4 season in 17^th place. But the board stuck with him and well done to them too. He three time LMA Manager of the Year and eight time Premier League manager of the Month will no doubt continue to do a very good job at Everton and I also believe he is one of the reasons why Everton are a lot of football fans ‘second team’ and this cannot be a bad thing for the club on a whole.