It was a case for the defence in last Saturday?s 1-1 home draw against Brighton but, as was the case at Everton a week earlier, the man of the match and player ratings were both won by central defender Maxime Estève although the tough competition came from his defensive partner Hjalmar Ekdal.
It was a close run thing between Estève and Ekdal, who had come in for the suspended Dara O?Shea and was making his first appearance since the home draw against Fulham at the start of February when he was replaced at half time and replaced by Estève for his debut.
In this game, Estève won the man of the match with 40% of the vote, followed by Ekdal who claimed a 33% share. Josh Brownhill, our goalscorer, was third with 7% and Josh Cullen just beat Sander Berge into fourth place with 6% of the vote. Those four players all featured at the top of the player ratings too and in the same order. Estève was the winner with a rating of 7.56 out of ten and Ekdal was again second; his rating was 7.50. Brownhill was third with 6.78 and Lorenz Assignon joined Cullen in joint fourth place with a rating of 6.31 out of ten.
This result has given Estève another ten points in the Up the Clarets Player of the Year Table with Ekdal winning six points alongside four points for Brownhill, two for Cullen and one point for Assignon.
Cullen has now moved into joint fifth place in the table alongside Luca Koleosho and last season?s player of the year, on recent form, will be looking to push towards second...