It was the PFA awards last night, and it was a great night for Manchester City.
2023/24 was an incredible season for the club, which culminated in the winning of an historic Treble.
City were absolutely amazing in the final few months of the campaign.
And there were just so many outstanding individuals.
And five of them were acknowledged in the official PFA Team of the Year: Ruben Dias, John Stones, Rodri, Kevin De Bruyne and Erling Haaland.
And Haaland, as expected, scooped the grandest prize – the PFA Player of the Year.
He was somehow beaten to the PFA Young Player of the Year award by Arsenal’s Bukayo Saka, though.
Saka had a great season, and after picking up his award, he was interviewed and asked to picked a ‘perfect footballer’.
And it was at that point he showed real admiration for one City player in particular. And it was a player who didn’t even attend last night’s ceremony as he was not named in the Team of the Season or up for individual awards…
Bukayo Saka shows admiration for Kyle Walker at PFA awards…
After picking up his award, Saka was asked by GOAL to build his perfect footballer, using a trait from any footballer.
For ‘right foot’, he picked Kevin De Bruyne. He couldn’t really pick anyone else, with the Belgian just a genius.
For ‘left foot’, he picked himself.
For ‘speed’, he plumped for his Arsenal teammate Gabriel Martinelli.
And then for ‘strength’, Saka chose someone you perhaps wouldn’t think of straight away, although it does make sense.
He chose City’s Kyle Walker, and then actually added ‘So strong man, Wow’.
Saka then finished off by picking Martin Odegaard’s ‘IQ’.
Nice to hear from Saka
It is interesting to hear Saka choose Walker for ‘strength’ when building his perfect footballer.
You just wouldn’t think it, considering how many players are well over 6ft tall and clearly spend plenty of time in the gym.
But Walker is definitely very strong.
He has always been a physical specimen, and his qualities often help him to defend against players really easily.
Saka is not the only Arsenal player to be singing the praises of a City star. Oleksandr Zinchenko has also been talking up Rodri as a player who has ‘everything’.
