Top 5 Premier League attackers who were one-season wonders
For foreign players coming into the Premier League, the challenge can be at times quite daunting. However, some players take to the Premier League just as if they were born to ply their trade in English football. Goals flow, victories follow and comparisons with legends are rife on a weekly basis.
However, some are able to sustain their performances, while the others fall apart. Be it confidence issues, fitness woes or just negative attitude, the ‘second season syndrome’ tends to separate the weak from the strong. Strikers and attacking midfielders are more prone to form worries and hence dominate this list without much surprise.
So here are the top 5 one-season wonders in Premier League history:
#1 Michu
Michu is quite literally the first name that comes to mind when one thinks about one-season wonders in football.
When Michael Laudrup, the then Swansea manager, brought Michu to South Wales for a mere £2m transfer, he was a relatively unknown figure. Adapting to English football like a swan to water with 18 goals, Michu became a major star in his first season itself. A brace against QPR on his Premier League debut set the tone, as Michu fired Swansea to an impressive mid-table finish and a League Cup triumph, the first ever silverware in Swansea City’s history.
(Video Courtesy: YRCHDWorldwide YouTube Channel)
Goals flowed and offers poured in as the likes of Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester United queued up to secure the services of the Spaniard. In fact, what should have been the high point in the striker’s career, a Spanish national team call-up, led to a major downfall.
Clearly shaken by the club’s shock sacking of Laudrup, he scored only two goals in his second season. Let down by a combination of bad attitude, constant injury woes and a flop loan spell at Napoli, Michu was shipped off to boyhood club Real Oviedo and remains little more than a memory among Swansea spectators.