OPINION
If there is a player who has surpassed expectations at West Ham United this season, it is right-back Pablo Zabaleta.
A summer signing may have sprung to mind for most, but it is the 33-year-old who deserves the utmost credit for how he has managed to keep Ryan Fredericks out of the spot for the majority of the season so far.
Fredericks now has a right to be sweating even more about his career at the club, as Football London have reported that the Hammers can trigger an option in Zabaleta’s current contract that will allow him to stay beyond the end of the campaign.
This is very bad news for Fredericks indeed, especially with the form that the ex-Premier League winner is currently in.
Many would have thought that a player eight years younger would easily usurp an aging defender like Zabaleta, but that could not be further from the truth.
Now, it is make or break time for the 26-year-old, and he must play out of his skin – or Zabaleta has the power to effectively end his career at the London Stadium.
He needs to prove to Manuel Pellegrini that he is the man for the job compared to the veteran mainstay or he might as well kiss goodbye to life in East London.
Fredericks only has three league appearances to his name, one of them coming in the season opener at Liverpool – a game where he was definitely not up to standard after being run ragged by Liverpool’s attack.
First impressions are everything, but that certainly was not the case for the free summer signing from Fulham.
Ever since then he has failed to conjure up an impressive performance of any sort, and Zabaleta has taken massive advantage of this.
This contract report could wspell the end for the 5ft 11in [Transfermarkt] man, but he must now play out of his skin to prevent kissing goodbye to his Irons career.
