Controversial Carlos — The Rarely Stated
Coincidentally, on this day last year, I wrote about the underrated and underappreciated playmaker Michael Laudrup. Moving forward by one year off the pitch and by one third on it, I touch upon an Argentine, diminutive to the extent that he often found himself in shadows that he could never outgrow.
Having third-party owners and ownership disputes, missing THAT penalty versus Uruguay, refusing to warm up in the match against Bayern Munich, RIP Fergie, breaking legs in Argentina and lastly, loads and loads of goals. It doesn’t come as a surprise that he is remembered for all the wrong reasons.
Might I ask, could you name few of the best Premier League strikers in the last decade? The most common answers would be Sergio Aguero, Harry Kane, Romelu Lukaku, Diego Costa and Luis Suarez from the more recent past, and Wayne Rooney, Robin van Persie, Didier Drogba and Fernando Torres from the immediately preceding period. A name that doesn’t pop up more often than it does, is that of the player remembered in this piece. This time, for the right reasons.
If you are a defender, Carlos Tevez running down at you is more terrifying than the scars running down his neck. He would choke the living soul out of you. One must be right in thinking that Ben Foster is still grateful to Michael Owen for that late derby winner, considering what Tevez did to him earlier in the match. Tevez’s tenacity and perseverance made him a menace to opposition defences. When I mention menace to opposition defences, Tevez wouldn’t be among the first three PL strikers of the recent past who would come to your mind. Another testament to how much of an underappreciated player he is.

The most effective language of strikers is numbers, a language that Tevez spoke pretty well in England. Granted, he had a slow start during his initial days in the country when he was plying his trade with West Ham. But since the turn of the year 2007 and his move to Manchester United in the summer, he kept getting better only to be overshadowed in appreciation by the bigger superstars in his team. After all, why would anyone talk about Tevez when there are Ronaldo and Rooney? Credits to the Old Trafford faithful though, for they did not fail to recognise his talent, constantly insisting Sir Alex to sign him up permanently albeit in vain.
With a move to cross-town rivals Manchester City, Tevez enjoyed two years of being the main man. In those two years, he racked up 43 goals in 66 PL appearances, being the joint Premier League Golden Boot winner for 2010–11 season. Also during those two years, in came Emmanuel Adebayor, Roque Santa Cruz, Mario Balotelli and Edin Dzeko to a team that already had Robinho and Craig Bellamy. City bolstered their attack whenever they were given the chance, in other words, they tried hard enough to give competition to Tevez. The knockout blow came at the end of those two years when Sergio Aguero came and marked the beginning of the end for him in sky blue colours. He finally fell prey to City’s limitless ambition.

At United, he fit into a system of high profile names, lived up to their standards and scored many crucial goals, but the 2007–09 era for United will always be more about Ronaldo and Rooney. The blue revolution in England has reached its zenith now thanks to players such as Aguero and Silva, but it was Tevez who spearheaded its initial days. At least 7 out of 10 City fans wouldn’t include Tevez in the top 5 City players of the last decade, although it was him who sent City to the top 4 during the transition years of the Arabian takeover.
It’s rather unfortunate that Tevez finds himself less revered than his contemporaries across both the Manchester clubs, but it’s terribly unfair that as a footballer he isn’t appreciated as much as he is supposed to be. In terms of both club statistics and honours, Tevez falls in the same league as someone like Torres, yet is criminally understated. And we are talking about a player who took his club to a Champions League final and was the Serie A Player of the Season when he was 31.
Three good and four underwhelming seasons have made Torres to be considered one of the best Premier League strikers of the recent past. Don’t be negligent about Tevez’s exploits like those Argentinian managers. It’s time that Carlos Tevez becomes a routine name in the class of elite PL strikers.
