After Leicester City’s 1-0 win over Crystal Palace at the weekend the scorer of the decisive goal joined an elite list. Jamie Vardy sits alongside names such as Theirry Henry, Ian Wright and Alan Shearer for scoring in seven consecutive league games. With such accolades comes attention, and the Foxes striker has been linked with a host of top clubs. But is he good enough to take a step up?
Before the Palace game reports linking him away from the King Power Stadium centred around clubs such as Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur. At this moment in time neither are enjoying the run of form Claudio Ranieri’s team are, but the assumption is always made that the traditional top six clubs will come good by the end of season.
Should that occur Vardy would be guaranteed European competition, and playing for one of the traditional big names in English football enhances the chances of representing the national team on a regular basis. Player’s like Peter Crouch and Emile Heskey got the majority of their time in an England shirt thanks to moves made at club level.
The idea of moving to a domestic rival wasn’t far-fetched, it was almost inevitable. What came as a shock was when Jamie Vardy’s name was mentioned in the same sentence as Real Madrid. Not to undermine the player’s ability, but it’s a heck of a jump to picture him alongside Ronaldo at the Bernabeu as he keeps Karim Benzema out of the side.
Ranieri has reacted by immediately bumping up his perceived monetary value. Even though Vardy has just signed a new contract it’s conceivable a fresh offering will be coming his way, if only to enhance his sell-on value by adding an appropriate clause.
Despite his current form it is hard to make a case for such a big money move. Football isn’t simply a game of stats, if it was all the keyboard warriors that are good at playing Football Manager would be walking into real life jobs.
Vardy performs an effective role at Leicester. They are not aiming to win the league and don’t compete at the top European level. It’s clear he has an eye for goal and he can be applauded for working hard to make chances for himself. He also expends a lot of energy chasing down lost causes for the team. There’s no doubt he gives 100%.
But a good work ethic can only take you so far, after that the rest is made up with raw ability. If effort alone was the main factor Paul Dickov would be mentioned in the same breath as Pele. Jamie Vardy works well for Leicester because they’re not demanding he fits into a technical set-up, like the Bayern Munich model for example.
Even his finishing lacks a certain finesse that we have seen from newcomers like Anthony Martial. The goal against Palace wasn’t a sublime chip that went straight to the net, it was dink and run. He’s effective in front of goal but better defenders at a higher level will contain him.
He’s currently enjoying a run in the Premier League that will falter the more familiar he becomes to the better pros. It’s only when this occurs will we see if he’s got the ability to play for a club like Real Madrid. If he can adapt, the links to Madrid will be justified.
Former Chelsea player Mark Stein also went on a run of scoring in seven games, he was never able to play at a higher level (Chelsea were also-rans at the time) so the current achievement should be taken with caution.
That’s not to say he can’t develop into a player worthy of joining a bigger club, but at the moment he still has some way to go.
[ad_pod id=’ffc-survey’ align=’center’]
[ad_pod id=’writeforus’ align=’center’]