Chelsea midfielder N'Golo Kante is on course to win his second Premier League title in two seasons with two different clubs.
The only previous time that happened is when Mark Schwarzer left title-winning Chelsea for Leicester in the summer of 2016, so the fact that Kante has done the reverse is a bit mad. But Kante has had a huge impact in Antonio Conte's team, and left a huge hole in the Leicester side he left, as he has gone on to have a fantastic second season in England.
He's been so good that he will almost certainly take a place in PFA Team Of The Year, again, and pundits and fand alike have been fawning over his performances all season long... But Joey Barton doesn't quite understand why.
Having played against him, Barton doesn't believe that Kante is all he's cracked up to be and is not in the discussion in terms of best midfielder in the world, as he revealed in an interview with French publication lejdd.fr:
For pundits, he's the best midfielder in the world. That's not true. He's very good, but I played against him 3 weeks ago. He's a great destroyer who played in a great team, but he's not a creator. It's impossible to be so definitive with a player who hasn't played in CL.
Interesting.
He's not wrong, but while he isn't the best all-around midfielder in the world, he has to be best at that 'destroyer' role as Barton described it, and that's why there's such an outpouring of love for his ability.
