Luis Suárez deserves to be PFA Player of the Year after his stunning season for Liverpool

Liverpool striker has gone from the Premier League's pantomime villain to the toast of dressing room circles

 

 

This Monday, April 21, marks the anniversary of Luis Suárez sinking his teeth into Chelsea’s Branislav Ivanovic at Anfield. The Liverpool striker didn’t draw blood, fortunately, but he did draw widespread disgust for the vile bite. What a difference a year makes.

This Sunday, April 27, the most acclaimed forward in the Premier League starts against Ivanovic and Chelsea at Anfield and then jets south to the Grosvenor House Hotel on Park Lane in London where he is 1-16 favourite to be named PFA Player of the Year. After the banquet, Suárez will be expected to say a few polite words, thanking his peers, team-mates and manager. It’s all sound-bites now; the nibbles are different.

Vilified a year ago by some players, many of whom had not forgotten his racist remark to Patrice Evra, Suárez is now the toast of dressing-room circles. Evra has revealed he voted for the 27-year-old. At the final whistle of Liverpool’s narrow win at Carrow Road on Sunday, Michael Turner was the first of the vanquished Norwich City players to walk over to shake Suárez's hand. Others followed, willingly acknowledging the class of their nemesis.

Next Monday, April 28, the day after the PFA dinner, voting opens online for the Football Writers’ Association Footballer of the Year, the oldest award, dating back to Stanley Matthews’ success in 1948. Some reporters will doubtless plump for Steven Gerrard, whose hunger for the title has helped define the season. Some will want to salute Adam Lallana, an English feelgood story and testament to Southampton’s verve and player-development. Chelsea’s John Terry and Eden Hazard have their backers. Ditto Yaya Toure and David Silva of Manchester City.

Some could be “ABS” – Anyone But Suárez – because they still feel he fails one of the criteria for Footballer of the Year, behaving by “precept and example”. This observer’s vote will be cast in Suárez’s favour exactly because he has strived to tame his on-field demons and, primarily, because he is undeniably the most significant, watchable footballer in the land. Suárez sends fans hurrying into grounds, wanting to see him warm up, let alone play. He wins games and, in all likelihood, titles. He has scored 30 goals in the league so far.