If at the beginning of the season you were told that one of the players signed from PSV Eindhoven by an English club this summer did well, you would probably thought that it would be Manchester United’s Memphis Depay. However this has not turned out to be the case, instead it is Georginio Wijnaldum at a poor, poor Newcastle who has taken more headlines.
Considering just how awful the Magpies have been this season, the Dutchman has been the only bright light for the Geordies, with Steve McClaren proving everyone who said he wasn’t up to the job right. Newcastle now sit 19th, with a squad that really should be doing better.
Players like Jonjo Shelvey, Siem De Jong, Andros Townsend, Henri Saviet, Chancel Mbemba and Seydou Doumbia should be fighting for European football, not relegation, and it shows just how far they have fallen. It seems a long, long time ago Newcastle were fighting for Europa League spots under Alan Pardew.
Now, much like McClaren’s hair, Newcastle are at risk of receding from the Premier League’s forehead. But, one bright spark has been Wijnaldum, who is the club’s top scorer so far this season with nine goals – three more than Ayoze Perez – which highlights just how lacklustre the forwards at St James’ Park have been.
With 41 goals in 109 games for PSV, Wijnaldum is definitely a talent and most likely the long term successor to Wesley Sneijder’s throne in the Dutch national team. As attacking midfielder for his country, he has got four goals in four appearances, highlighting just how much the Oranje rely on him.
Although there haven’t been many happy Geordies this season, Wijnaldum has occasionally given them reason to smile with his performances in black and white. As a player, he has too often pulled the rest of the team with him, and has looked so much better than his team-mates far too often.
The Dutchman looks like he should be at another bigger team, and considering Newcastle thought they could be playing in Europe, he must be gifted a move away. There are so many teams who could benefit from this talent – Arsenal for one need a leader, with players like Mesut Ozil going missing more often than not against the big sides.
The player’s versatility is one which is sure to make other teams glance at him, and his quality is sufficient for some of the biggest teams around. At the age of 25, he is soon to enter his peak, and when he does his form should peak too. At Newcastle he is being wasted, and in the likelihood that they are relegated he should seek a move to a much better team. His talent is too great to be wasted in the Championship, especially considering he could be a player in any of the top four teams’ squads.
The Netherlands may not be going to France this summer, but it won’t stop there being interest in this flying Dutchman. Though Depay gets the attention, Wijnaldum is, at the moment, the better talent.
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