Adam rises from a steeper starting point

SOCCER ANGLES:It is hard to see beyond Nemanja Vidic for player of the year, but Charlie Adam deserves his place among the contenders

THE EMAIL dropped this week: vote for your player of the season. In seasons such as this it is a choice that is welcome in an unwelcome sort of way, when plenty of players have scaled peaks for a certain spell, then descended.

It can be argued no one has stayed up there from last August until now.

Nemanja Vidic is possibly one exception. The striking defender has played 35 times for Manchester United so far and given United are still in with a chance of the treble as we turn into April, Vidic’s position as the team leader cannot be underestimated. If not immense, his contribution has been telling and significant. And there could be more to come – though once the votes are cast, disappointingly.

Vidic would be a deserving winner, whose name would not look out of place in the list of previous footballers of the year.

And it is some list. The eye did get caught again when seeing that United’s 1999 treble coincided with David Ginola winning the award – a fact Alex Ferguson has not forgotten and mentioned in his speech saluting Wayne Rooney last May – but that was rectified to an extent when Roy Keane won it the following year.

Go back further and an expression of surprise comes when Steve Perryman’s name crops up as winner in 1981-82, but then Perryman was no duffer.

Perryman and Ginola: two Tottenham players; and another, Gareth Bale, will be the recipient of a number of votes for his campaigning runs down Spurs’ flank this season. Even if he does not win overall, Bale has definitely supplied a couple of the unforgettable moments of the season, home and away to Inter Milan, the European Cup holders.

Yet another Tottenham player, Luka Modric, may also warrant a swathe of votes. The Croatian midfielder is an exceptional footballer and Spurs are having some season.

In European terms, Spurs are over-achieving. The opposite can be said of Manchester City in different terms. Out of Europe and drifting in the Premier League – four points from the last 12 – City have nevertheless got two performers who merit consideration.

Carlos Tevez will certainly attract support due to the goals and energy he has once again brought to the club.

Vincent Kompany has also been impressive, albeit less spectacularly. Further down the table, Scott Parker has again been invaluable to West Ham.

It is always problematic that the slips arrive with the two most important months of the season to go but if a judgment is made on the season to this stage, then the most entertaining participants have been Blackpool and their most influential player has been Charlie Adam.

A year ago today, Blackpool and Adam were playing at Scunthorpe. They won, but that still left them a place outside the Championship play-off zone. A month later they had harassed their way into those play-offs, then gloriously won the final at Wembley. Adam was fantastic.

However, the scepticism that greeted Blackpool’s arrival in the Premier League was even greater than the delight in Lancashire. How could a club with this budget, this squad and such a lack of experience cope? Their ground wasn’t even ready.

Eyebrows rose when on the season’s opening day Blackpool only went and won 4-0 at Wigan, though they fell the next week when Arsenal put six past them.

But since then Blackpool have built and built, scored and scored. And Charlie Adam has excelled. The former Rangers apprentice did not look to have too bright a future when he was released at Ibrox and sent on loan to Blackpool two years ago. He was 23 and should have made it by then, that was the consensus.

But to be at Blackpool-United in January was to see how far Adam has come. This would have a claim on being the most exciting game of the season so far and in the first half Adam was the outstanding figure. He twice embarrassed his Scotland midfield colleague Darren Fletcher with cheeky skill. Adam was the driving force behind almost every Blackpool move and they were 2-0 up at half time.

The introduction of Ryan Giggs changed everything, including the scoreline, and Adam faded as United surged. But at the end of the game, no doubt fully aware Liverpool were planning a bid for Adam, Ferguson said “his corners alone are worth ten million”.

As Ferguson chuckled to himself, and Kenny Dalglish didn’t, it turned out Tottenham were the club preparing to move for Adam. For whatever reason they did it too late but it was another signal of Adam’s increased value and just what a season he is having.

Now it seems Ferguson is also contemplating Adam in a United shirt. That is some transformation and says everything about Adam’s season. He probably will not win footballer of the year and he might not get many votes at all. It is still hard to see beyond Vidic, but Adam deserves his place among the contenders on the podium.

He started a lot further back on the grid than them.

Houllier’s survival hopes rest with wingers and a prayer

IT WAS difficult to watch England’s fluid, creative and competitive display against Ghana on Tuesday night and not think of Aston Villa. Two of England’s best players were Ashley Young and Stewart Downing, Villa’s wingers.

Yet Villa can be relegated and the atmosphere surrounding Gerard Houllier’s seven-month “reign” at the club already feels end-of-empire. Before, during and after Villa’s last match, the 1-0 home defeat to a Wolves team that cost less and which costs less, the fans turned on Houllier with a degree of vehemence that shocked neutrals.

Houllier, we’re told, does not know what he is doing. He has made mistakes, certainly. The remark about losing to Liverpool provoked perhaps too strong a reaction but the decision to field a weakened team at Manchester City in the FA Cup was extraordinary. City don’t exactly go full pelt under Roberto Mancini. So for Houllier to virtually concede the game stunned the thousands who had paid to travel north.

Today those Villa supporters will travel to Everton. Their mood will be one of expectation, of defeat. Yet surely Villa have the players to prevent relegation? Downing and Young are two of them.

* Among severalnotable aspects at Arsenal last Saturday for the Scotland-Brazil game was the overblown reaction to Neymar's skills – and then his incorrect allegation of Scottish racism.

But what struck equally was the price of tickets.

The cheapest was €35, on the halfway line it was €73 a seat. Who pays this for a friendly in a recession?

Over 50,000 apparently.