West Ham Players Surge in Match Week 10 B/R Power Rankings

After consecutive 1-0 losses, West Ham have secured a point against Leicester City and with it comes a resurgence for some West Ham players in the Bleacher Report power rankings form Sam Tighe.

The Bleacher Report weekly ranking, EPL100 can be seen here. It ranks the best players by positions after each week, taking into consideration their performances from the week that was, and the form they have strung together over the past few matches.

Let’s get into the Iron’s rankings:

Keepers: Lukasz Fabianski – 1st place

Previous: 7th

Justice is finally served for the West Ham keeper! His performances have been so incredibly important for the Hammers this season and now he reaches the top of the power rankings to prove it. Against Leicester this week Fabianski had 21 shots directed towards his net with seven on target, despite the one that went in on a massive deflection the Polish phenom was up to the task and was stellar.

Fabianski had the highest climb in the keeper category with a +6 rating from his position last week. This massive climb also garnered author Tighe’s keeper editorialization on Instagram reading:

"“Catching and parrying his way to the top of the goalkeeper rankings is Lukasz Fabianski, who continued his excellent start to life at West Ham United against Leicester City this weekend in the 1-1 draw."

Right-backs: Pablo Zabaleta – 7th

Last week – 7th (stay)

Pablo Zabaleta continues to prove that age is just a number for him, leading a young defensive core for West Ham and being a weekly starter for the Irons at the Premier League level. Zabaleta didn’t have an easy night at Leicester either, as the Noble red card led to an all-out assault for sixty minutes for the Foxes.

Ben Chilwell lead the attack down Zabaleta’s wing all night but he couldn’t break down the Argentinian defender. A particular highlight was Zab telling Chilwell to ‘man up’ and get on with it after Chilwell cried out after losing a 50/50 to a man twelve years his elder.

Centre-backs: Issa Diop – 8th

Last week – 16th

With a massive leap in the centre-backs top 20, Issa Diop establishes himself with a +8 ranking coming off of his terrific games against Leicester City. With the largest leap in the position, Tighe highlighted him and wrote:

"The biggest jump this week is Issa Diop’s, who was as brilliant against Leicester City as he has been for a few weeks now. He looked all set for a rocky start to Premier League life after scoring an own goal on his debut against Arsenal, but he’s flushed that from the system and put together a really strong sequence of performances."

Diop has been linked back to France with a rumor surrounding a £50 million price tag on him just a few months after West Ham scooped him up for £24m from Toulouse. It’s most likely a fake rumor but with Mourinho openly praising him after a 3-1 West Ham win over Manchester United, who knows. Anything less than £100m would be unacceptable in my eyes – one to watch for sure!

Defensive/Central Midfielders: Declan Rice – 11th

Last Week: 14th

Can I quote myself here? I’ll save myself the challenge of hubris and paraphrase: When West Ham do well you’ll see Declan Rice’s value raise and when they struggle (whether he plays well or not) Rice’s value will drop. It’s just the condition of being a defensive midfielder – if you’re not conceding you’re deemed as an effective player and vice versa.

Rice showed up massively against Leicester effectively taking over as West Ham’s heartbeat and leader after Noble was sent off. It’s going to be his midfield for the next three matches and he has a chance to step up and establish himself as West Ham’s new main man with the skipper’s absence.

He headed up a weirdly effective midfield that ended up with Snodgrass on his right side and Angelo Ogbonna on his left, which did all they could to keep LLeicesterto just one goal. Massive performance from a kid who plays beyond his years.

Strikers: Marko Arnautovic – 10th

Last week – 9th

It’s kind of nice to see that Marko Arnautovic can take a week off and still rank top ten in Premier League strikers, isn’t it? With a stomach illness taking him out of selection for the Leicester City match he appropriately drops one space to just remain a ranked player in this list.

He’s confirmed to be back and available for the Carabao Cup match with Tottenham by ExWHUemployee on twitter so he’ll be a starter come match week eleven with Burnley in the Hammers’ sights. He needs to get back on the scoresheet, however, to remain one of the Premier League’s hottest strikers.