Is Steven Taylor’s dramatics necessary?
Newcastle United defender Steven Taylor is one of the clubs star performers on his day. He has an excellent tackling ratio and is one of the few Premier League players who plies his trade at his home town club.
There is a lot to admire about the Magpies centre back. His amateur dramatics is not on this list. Against Stoke at the weekend when Yohan Cabaye scored a stunning free kick, the “geordie hero” Taylor stole the headlines for all the wrong reasons.
His distracting of the goalkeeper and being an outright nuisance certainly did not will the ball into the back of the net, nor put off the keeper.
It made him look foolish. The aspect of the 27-year-old’s game that is prone to look for attention away from football is detracting from his positive displays, when fit.
Taylor may want to consider knuckling down rather than trying to pursue his career in acting on a football pitch.
He may think that saying comments such as “I would rather collect stamps rather than play for Sunderland” make him immune to abuse in the North East. It does not.
On set pieces he similarly likes to gee up the players and point and pester around whereas he should be looking at who he is marking.
The players he shares a pitch are professional footballers. Maybe he should bear this in mind too.
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