Liverpool’s Craig Bellamy is reborn

It has been an eventful first season back at Anfield for Craig Bellamy. He has had to deal with the loss of a great friend and team mate in Gary Speed and has had the responsibility of leading the Liverpool attack in recent games due to the 8 game suspension of Luis Suarez.

Bellamy has played for 10 different clubs in Britain so far in his career as well as being a nation’s hero for Wales. Bellamy is renowned for his unbelievable pace and deadly finishing along with his volatile character on the pitch.

Off the pitch he is a humble and charitable man. The recent broadcasted documentary in the week

“Craig Bellamy’s African Dream” shows the commitment and kindness of the man who has invested £1.2 million into a Football academy in Sierra Leone. The document helped give both footballers and football a good name amidst the ongoing saga with John Terry, Luis Suarez and Harry Redknapp at the moment; it just shows how footballers do give back to those in need of money and resources.

With each club Bellamy has been at he has contributed well scoring goals, his most successful spell coming at Newcastle from 2001-05 where he played 93 times and scored 28 goals at a time when Newcastle were challenging well in the Premier league and in Europe.

It was at Newcastle where Bellamy played with his good friend Gary Speed and the two clearly formed a close friendship that would continue into the national squad when Speed became Wales manager for a brief spell whilst Bellamy was the captain.

 It was clear how much Gary Speed meant to Craig Bellamy as when the death of Speed was announced on the morning of the 27^th November Liverpool were due to play Man City in the evening. It was a wise decision made by Dalglish not to include Bellamy into the squad for that game as his mind wouldn’t have been understandably in the right place for the match.

However Bellamy showed everyone how strong a man he was as two days later in the Carling Cup he put in an excellent performance that Speed would have been proud with as Liverpool beat Chelsea 0-2, both goals were created by Craig himself.

It was when Craig moved to Manchester City in January 2009 that the talent of the little Welshmen was returning to form since his days at Newcastle. He regularly scored goals for the club in the season and a half he was at the club. His highly publicised disagreements with Mancini saw him go on loan for a season at Cardiff before returning to Liverpool at the start of this season.

His form of late has been brilliant. He has scored 7 goals in his last 7 starts for Liverpool, taking his tally to 9 goals for the season so far. With the absence of Luis Suarez and the inconsistent form of Andy Carroll, Bellamy has stepped up to the plate as the main front man for the club.

As a Reds fan for me he has been the player of the season so far, not just for his contributions on the field but for the fact that he has consistently put in a good performance whilst dealing with the loss of a close friend and being involved in all the charity work he does.

As Dalglish said after the Wolves match “I wish he was 23 not 32” as now that Suarez is back and available Bellamy could form a deadly partnership with the Uruguayan that could see the Reds claim fourth spot come the end of the season. At this moment in time Craig Bellamy is in the form of his life.

Daniel Clark @ClarkyD92

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