Brian Brobbey’s On My Mind
· Yahoo Sports
There’s that lad in every under-11 and under-12s team who has realised their physical peak before they venture into adulthood. The one that has the seasoned exterior of a middle-aged man: a beard, a bush, and the brute strength of some of the dads watching on from the touchline.
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Invariably, these lads will be outgrown by their peers before the age of 16, and that freakish physical prowess they once had will be swallowed up as the playing field evens itself out.
But what happens when that lad who dwarfs everyone else at 12 still does so well into manhood? Well, look no further than Brian Brobbey.
Earlier this season, pictures surfaced of Sunderland’s number nine as a youngster, looking as corporeally imposing as he does today, except he was shrugging off some frightened pre-pubescent teen instead of a terrified, fully-grown Premier League centre-half.
There is arguably no striker in world football quite like our Dutchman. While we are very much in the era of number-nine powerhouses, whose bread and butter is the physical humiliation of defenders, the former Ajax forward is a rule unto himself.
Since his acquisition, for a man of such stature, he sure has kept a relatively low profile when it’s come to fans and media prematurely naming their player of the season. Granit Xhaka, Robin Roefs, Noah Sadiki, Enzo Le Fée, Dan Ballard, Nordi Mukiele, Reinildo, and Omar Alderete have all been lauded, and enjoyed their fair share of nominations.
Yet, has anyone stepped up in the big moments quite like Brobbey? Netting decisive winning goals against Bournemouth, Crystal Palace, and Newcastle and scoring equalisers against Arsenal and Tottenham, all of which seemingly in emphatic fashion.
This unassuming lad, once mooted as a wonderkid, was brought to Wearside like so many have in recent years, looking to rebuild a reputation that once preceded him.
A victim of extortion attempts from a notorious Amsterdam criminal, Brobbey had understandably taken his eye off the ball while contending with death threats, letter bombs, and close friends being shot. Refusing help from those of influence at the Netherlands’ most decorated club perhaps demonstrated the true measure of the man that we now proudly call one of our own.
While his winning goal against the hosts on Sunday will long be carved into Wearside folklore as the defining moment of the match, his work for the 88 minutes in the lead-up to that turn and swivel deserves as much commendation.
From start to finish, Brobbey ran Newcastle ragged. Winning possession on four occasions, as well as claiming the same number of duels, the ex-RB Leipzig man quite literally led from the front.
Who wore black and white, and had faces red all over? Dan Burn, Malick Thiaw, and Sven Botman after 90+ minutes against Brobbey. The aforementioned were no match, with the latter going off injured, having been bullied by his compatriot all game. Eddie Howe’s conveyor belt of supposedly dominant centre-backs were pulled left and right, failing to compete with Brobbey, who thrived on the occasion.
He ran the channels, created space for Chemsdine Talbi, Chris Rigg, and Sadiki to exploit, he was solid in the air, and his hold-up play was effortless. This was a display that demonstrated Brobbey at his unfettered best.
It’s not just his physical outlay that’s supremely impressive, but his footballing intelligence. The way he can shift and remould defensive shape with his movement doesn’t happen by chance. There is a selflessness to much of his play, and while Le Fée’s magic found its way to his feet for the last-gasp winner, it was initially Brobbey’s run which drew both Burn and Thiaw to afford the Frenchman the space to make the assist.
It was the nearest to a complete performance I’ve seen from a Sunderland striker for a long time. While he may not be a 20-goal-a-season target man (and if he was, we’d have an even tougher fight on our hands to keep him), he’s an altruistic, no-nonsense facilitator who looks to be rediscovering a little more than just a touch of class.