Tag Archives: jordan rhodes blackburn

Jordan Rhodes: Flying Scotsman can cut it with the best

  By O-Posts Team | February 7, 2013 - 18:58 | , , , , , ,
Leave a comment

The £8 million spent by Steve Kean on a player who had never played higher that the third division raised plenty of eyebrows, but the Scot has proved he can be one of the great British strikers of his generation

It is often said that, in the enticing world of the football league,a player always faces a great challenge in making the step up to the next division unless he possesses either exceptional talent or vast experience. Many have tried and failed; their careers being somewhat stunted by the failure to adapt.

One player who certainly has the natural flair and determination to not only make the switch – but to make it seem effortless – is Blackburn’s Jordan Rhodes.

Rhodes, 23, started his career with Ipswich town and has shown goal scoring prowess ever since his first season in English football. After less than a year with the tractor boys’ youth squad he was called up to the England Under-17 squad. His knack for scoring goals has been evident at all of Rhodes’ clubs, and he has proved his worth by shining at all levels from League Two to the Championship.

In 2011-12 whilst at Huddersfield Rhodes, who cost (recently departed) Simon Grayson’s team a mere £350,000, was in marvellous form. The Terriers had an astounding season, earning promotion to the Championship, and Rhodes set the standard. He registered a staggering 36 goals in 40 games, winning him the division’s player of the season award and earning him a call-up to the Scottish national team, for whom he qualifies having schooled there for over five years.

Last summer inevitable speculation surrounded Rhodes’ immediate future; would he stay with Huddersfield and attempt to prosper in he Championship alongside his longstanding team mates? Would he make the perilous step up two divisions to the Premier League (as was heavily touted) by joining Fulham?

Jermaine Beckford once decided to make this ambitious leap when joining Everton after having, like Rhodes, an impressive season in League One with a Yorkshire club.

This ultimately backfired for Beckford, whose career at Leicester City is currently in doubt. Rhodes sensibly chose not to follow the same steps as Beckford, but instead to join recently relegated Blackburn in a deal which could accumulate to £8 million. The record fee for a Championship player, this was seen by many as crazy money but he has proved doubters wrong by showing that he is a top striker.

With a hectic series of events occurring off the pitch at Ewood Park, Rhodes has managed to prove to the club they were right to invest so much money in him. By scoring an impressive 20 goals already, he has won over fans and lead us to pose ourselves the question: ‘Would Jordan Rhodes make it in the Premier League?’

From watching Rhodes this season, I, for one, can make the assumption that he demonstrates all the qualities required by a top flight striker. He has a wide variety of traits: aerial prowess, which he demonstrated in 2009, when he scored a hat trick of headers in an astonishing 8 minutes; robustness; great movement; shrewd anticipation and most importantly superb finishing ability.

 

The young man is improving rapidly, and unless Michael Appleton’s team can re-establish themselves in the Premier League, it would be a surprise if Rhodes saw out his 5 year contract with Blackburn.

If he does seek pastures new, global advisor Shebby Singh and his friends at Venky’s would be adamant on at least recouping the £8 million – which now seems to be a bargain. There is no doubt in my mind that Rhodes will be playing in the Premiership before too long.

With Arsenal’s lack of an out-and-out centre forward capable of replacing Robin van Persie, I feel Arsene Wenger could do a lot worse than bringing the Scot to The Emirates, despite his inexperience.

That undoubtedly would be a big leap for Rhodes, who is progressing rapidly. I look forward to seeing him form a partnership with another striker in top form, Steven Fletcher, for a Scotland team under new management.

Wherever he ends up, the future is definitely bright for Jordan Rhodes.

 

Written by Richard Burn

Follow him on Twitter @richard_burn15

Please like O-Posts on Facebook

You can follow O-Posts on Twitter @OPosts

Blackburn: All Rhodes lead to Jordan for the Rovers’ future

  By O-Posts Team | November 19, 2012 - 18:35 | , , , ,
Leave a comment
article-0-15078023000005DC-830_634x391

After Blackburn’s hapless owners Venky’s finally lost patience with Steve Kean seven matches into this season, the decision was made to turn to Henning Berg, former centre-half at Rovers and fans’ favourite, charged with the unenviable task of guiding the Lancashire club back to the Premier League at the first time of asking by the club’s Global Advisor Shebby Singh.

The ever-diminishing reputation of Rovers’ distant owners spawned little interest in a job that promises to balance a need for immediate success against a backdrop of financial risk, so Berg, a manager of limited experience in his native Norway, was the man left to carry out Singh’s challenging remit.

After six years in management to relative success with Lyn and Lillestrom, Blackburn would be Berg’s first coaching job in the high-pressure demands of domestic English football. Factor in the fact the employees are a processed foods-group that has endeavoured to alienate the fan, it becomes a very imposing challenge for the 43 year old. Yet, the Norwegian took it, perhaps a decision facilitated by the identity of his main striker, one Jordan Rhodes.

Things are made considerably easier for a manager when he has at his disposal a player of Rhodes’s ilk, a fine goal-scorer operating at a near-unbelievable strike rate. His hat-trick on Saturday afternoon away at Peterborough bringing him to a tally of 14 so far this season, building on his 40 goal haul for Huddersfield last season which saw him make the £8 million move to Ewood Park this summer. Just 8 goals short of a league century at the age of 22 is an incredible record, one that stands the Scotsman as perhaps the best centre-forward outside of the Premier League.

Rhodes seems destined for the top tier and if it wasn’t for a degree of hesitancy from the top clubs towards his 79 goals for Huddersfield being confined to League One, then he may have already made the jump. Blackburn, necessitating the need to return to the top table at the first attempt, saw fit to gamble a club record £8 million on the striker and he has immediately set about repaying such a grandiose fee; 9 goals have been notched for his new club, including vital winners at Bristol City and at home to Watford, a strike to earn a point at Derby and of course Saturday’s hat-trick, ensuring Berg’s maiden Blackburn win at the fourth attempt.

His treble showcased his poaching talent, 2 headers were supplemented by a coolly taken finish past Robert Olejnik in the Peterborough goal, a performance to remind everyone that he can convert chances regardless of how they are provided, just as long as he is fed in his spiritual home of the 18 yard box. It capped off a superb week for Rhodes in which he struck twice for Scotland in Luxembourg on Wednesday night, only denied a hat-trick there by the presence of a linesman’s raised flag as he headed past the keeper. It was the perfect riposte in the aftermath of Craig Levein’s passing as Scotland coach for whom, bizarrely, Rhodes was not a regular, a refusal to recognise such a potent goal-threat perhaps hastening Levein’s sacking.

The red-hot striker bemoaned his failure to net a third in Luxembourg but he represents a hopeful future for the Tartan Army should one expect he would be given a permanent place in the squad. His presence for Scotland will be inevitable should he continue in the same clinical vain for Blackburn who have returned to the play-off places in the wake of Rhodes’s salvo at London Road.

A hefty reliance on him to keep scoring will be vital for Rovers as well as Berg’s own hopes to fulfil his remit of promotion should even if that fails, Rhodes’s goals would still be of interest to a Premier League club, rendering the perhaps-over inflated £8 million signing a safe investment for the future as well as a calculated gamble.

So far under the stewardship of his new Scandinavian coach, the Scottish striker has hit four goals in four games and it is maybe not a coincidence that a surge in form has arisen under a fresh influence.

Rhodes was operating as a lone frontman under Steve Kean, a role he admitted he struggled with: “I play a lot with my back to goal here, there were other players to do that at Huddersfield” he said, “it is something I definitely need to improve upon but I’m enjoying myself here and I’m hoping to spend years with he club if they’ll have me.” His response possibly giving a window into the humility and desire that stands the ingested in such good stead for the future.

Berg may alter Rhodes’s role in order to maximise his goal threat and allow other players to support the goal-scoring burden, Mauro Formica netted his first goal since April to provide the colour to the Rhodes hat-trick on Saturday.

Whatever Berg does to bring the best out of Rhodes in front of goal, he needs it to work, both for his future, and the future of Blackburn Rovers.

 

Written by Adam Gray

Follow him on Twitter @AdamGray1250

Please like O-Posts on Facebook

You can follow O-Posts on Twitter @OPosts