Some stories in football just warm the heart. Among those, “comeback” stories are right up there alongside David vs Goliath upsets and championship fairytales. In the Premier League this season, there has been a comeback story of the highest order to the extent that it is not flying under the radar anymore.
Luton Town, who were widely expected to make the basement of the league their home for the season are showing fight and desire that is winning plaudits all over the country. After 31 games, they are only three points of safety and the best-placed team to avoid relegation of the three promoted teams.
That is a development nobody saw coming, mainly because outside of some smart additions and free transfers, their squad, man for man, looked severely short of the quality needed to survive in the first division’s ruthless jungle.
Enter Ross Barkley and a career renaissance that has been the story of the season. Here’s the rise, fall, and rise story of Barkley, who is making a genuine case for an international comeback after a second “breakthrough”, all at the age of 30!
He’s got the whole world in his hands
Barkley had the world at his feet. His breakthrough at Everton reminded so much of a young Wayne Rooney. Barkley had the same fearlessness, thrust, and passion. He played every game at 100 mph and put in the effort like it was the last time he’ll ever lace up his boots.
Add to that his on-ball skills, pace ability to manipulate space on the pitch, and his eye for a pass, and England looked like they finally had the industrious No 10 they had long desired.
There were 13 goals and 17 assists over two seasons for an Everton team that wasn’t really dominating games from start to finish. Barkley was the stardust in a team full of hardworking players but that didn’t mean he reined in his efforts. If anything, Barkley’s greatest quality was that despite his obvious world-class talent, he worked hard.
Needless to say, he had proven he wasn’t a flash in the pan and was ready for more. The English elites were more than obliging when Barkley was ready to move. He exchanged one blue jersey for another.
Not a “Nice” London nightmare
Chelsea are arguably the toughest club for a player to establish themselves. Not because of an abundance of quality like Manchester City, but because it is a club in perennial upheaval, be it the manager, a glut of new signings, or more recently, the ownership change.
Barkley came in a whirlwind after a protracted transfer saga but was still rated extremely highly. However, his exuberant style of play was starting to wreak havoc on his body already.
A recurring hamstring problem forced him to miss 46 games in the 2017/18 season for Everton and Chelsea combined. Football moves quickly and at Chelsea, it moves even quicker. Soon, Barkley found himself out of favour at Stamford Bridge. He ultimately did have two seasons where he played north of 1000 minutes across all competitions but he was always on the outside looking in in terms of career prospects.
His London nightmare finally ended when he joined France’s OGC Nice on a free transfer for the 2022/23 season. There were signs of the old Barkley but four goals and two assists in 920 appearances, plus Nice pivoting to a youth-centric approach to recruitment meant he hadn’t done enough to convince them of his value long-term.
That’s when a move appeared on the horizon which on paper, looked like a disaster waiting to happen but turned out to be a masterstroke, by the club and the player.
Version 2.0 and a renaissance story
A silky No 10 with an injury history joins a team that plays intense football and was expected to be without the ball for much of the season in a campaign they were widely expected to be relegated.
It looked like Barkley had learned nothing from Jesse Lingard’s nightmare at Nottingham Forest and was consigning himself to the same fate. Relegation, no chance to make an impression in a team that is perenially an underdog, and ultimately fading into obscurity.
How wrong were the predictions! Not only did Luton blow past expectations, they did so as Barkley reinvented himself to startling success. Gone was the player who played at 100mph who lacked quality decision-making. In his place, a surgical deep midfielder had arrived who formed the bedrock of Luton’s attacks and functioned as the first line of defence out of possession.
Barkley has been deployed as a deeper midfielder by Rob Edwards. His off-the-ball pressing has come on leaps and bounds to add to his ever-improving passing repertoire. In a deeper role, he has the whole pitch in front of him which has allowed him to function as a quarterback, while retaining his box-crashing instincts to contribute with goals and assists as well.
Four goals and four assists in the league don’t tell the whole story of the player who is making everything happen at Kenilworth road. Barkley 1.0 was a whirlwind talent who didn’t know what to do with his physical gifts.
Barkley 2.0 is the complete midfielder who is driving success against all odds. Which brings us to the England question.
From Luton to Lions
England’s midfield options are plenty but curiously, the profiles of players is so similar that playing them together is not very simple (Deja vu for Lampard-Gerrard-Scholes, anyone?). It is why an “orchestrator” like Kobbie Mainoo instantly made the team better with his introduction because the current England side has an abundance of attack-minded midfielders who start in the centre but inevitably find themselves in the opposition box due to their attacking gifts.
Enter Ross Barkley. With 33 caps to his name, Barkley’s international career looked to be done and despite this renaissance, that would have been the case had he still been a No 10.
Barkley 2.0, however, is tailor-made for England. A pivot of Mainoo and Barkley in a 4-2-3-1, or even him as a sole No 6 in a 4-3-3 makes the whole team tick now. He has the edge in experience over Mainoo and his renewed defensive discipline and deep-lying playmaking skills compliment the swashbuckling, box-crashing traits of players like Jude Bellingham and increasingly, Declan Rice.
A first-glance at the squad also makes it clear that there is a player there who should make way for Barkley. Jordan Henderson keeps getting selected for the intangibles he brings to the side but sooner rather than later, quality has to trump everything, especially when the tactical match is there. Most importantly, Barkley has seen all the ups and downs in the game so he is well-placed to become a leader in the group as well if that’s what Southgate values more.
It’s time to make another bold call after Mainoo was fast-tracked into the senior setup. At the start of the season, “Barkley for England” would have been banter by Luton Town fans who had got a big name but one they didn’t expect much from. Now? It’s a national debate with more than a hint of reality.
It’s THE comeback story of the season and needs to be punctuated with a return to The Three Lions.