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Aveek Chaudhuri, June 5, 2021

It’s official! Earlier today, the Premier League announced that Manchester City defender Ruben Dias won the Premier League Player of the Season award. This anticipated win comes after Dias helped Manchester City win the club’s fifth Premier League title in his first season at the club.

Despite being a newcomer to arguably Europe’s toughest league, he has established himself as one of the best defenders in the world with his commanding style of play and his ability to lock down the league’s deadliest forwards. With the addition of Dias, Pep Guardiola has been able to make a formidable defensive duo with the Portugese and John Stones which saw City only lose 6 games in the league all season, 2 coming when Dias wasn’t playing. Certainly an upgrade from the 9 games City lost last season.

Dias’s individual statistics also justify his win as player of the season. He ranked third for passes completed in the Premier League with 2,713 passes, only behind teammate Rodri and Tottenham’s Pierre-Emile Højbjerg. He completed 54% of his tackles and had 90 total clearances, 49 being in the air. He had zero errors leading to goals this season and recovered the ball for the team 135 times. And he was very disciplined, being yellow carded only 4 times all season and having 0 red cards.

Despite Dias being an obvious candidate for the player of the season award, there are critics and claims that Tottenham’s Harry Kane or Manchester United's Bruno Fernandes should have won the award. After all, Harry Kane won both the Premier League Golden Boot with 23 goals and the Premier League Playmaker of the Season award with 14 assists. Bruno Fernandes also had great numbers, having 18 goals and 12 assists while helping his team finish second. However, Dias’s status as the Premier League winner along with his influence on the team most likely put him above the other two as the player of the season.