West Ham United defender Pablo Zabaleta believes that midfielder Declan Rice can become one of the club’s greatest ever players.
Rice is a part of the recently-formed midfield trio that also includes Pedro Obiang and Mark Noble, and Zabaleta reckons that the 19-year-old has what it takes to go down as a real success with the Hammers.
Zabaleta added that the young ace still has room for improvement in his game, but he has been impressed by Rice’s maturity and his ability to churn out good performances on a regular basis for the first team.
“Declan is young, he still has room for improvement for sure, but you can see he has the right attitude and ability to be become one of the greatest players for West Ham,” he told the club’s website.
“He looks so mature and he has proven week in, week out that he can perform for the team, so as a teammate for me he is one of those young players that you like to look after and all the information I can give to him I will.
“We don’t need to put so much pressure on him now, we need to help him to keep improving. It’s step by step and then let’s see how far he can go as a player.”
OPINION
There has been a lot floating around about Declan Rice recently, not least pundits who have been full of praise for his performance against Chelsea on Sunday. The youngster deserves all of the praise that he can get, especially off one of his teammates. Zabaleta has played with some world-class players in his time – particularly during his time at Manchester City – so he knows a good player in the making when he sees one. Like with most young players, he still believes that there is some room for improvement with Rice, but that will come with time. At 19-years-old, he plays like someone far beyond their years, so it will be exciting to see what type of player he will develop into. The fact that Zabaleta thinks that Rice can go down as one of the Irons’ greatest ever players is a huge compliment on his behalf – and it shows that Rice already has the attributes to go down as a roaring success.
