that does not abstain him from being called out for being poor this season, in my opinion
Can you name me a player who hasn't been poorer than their previous standards?
Because I'm struggling.
Worse than previous seasons: Trent, Robbo, pointless including the centre backs, Gini (agreed), Salah, Bobby, Sadio
Arguably Trent has been better in patches but not overall
Hendo I don't really have an opinion on but suspect he would join the others above; Millie has defo got worse as he loses half a yard of pace
Fabinho would be my POTY but even he hasn't been better than previous seasons (not at DM anyway), it's just everyone else has been worse than him
Thiago not applicable as it's his first season, nor is Jota, nor is Curtis really as this is effectively his first season (done very well for me) and same for Nat and Rhys (both also better than could have been reasonably expected)
No point even considering the usual sicknotes like Keita, Ox, Shaq, Div (and the list goes on) and the new sicknotes like Kostas
I do actually think Alisson's keeping has got a little bit better, and that's ignoring his last minute headers, so he's the only player I can think of who has actually shown a wee bit more than in previous years (and I reckon plenty will disagree that Ali has got any better)
So Gini is in pretty good company among almost every single one of his teammates in not being as good as we have come to expect.
For me the biggest drop-off in performance has been Sadio, by an absolute mile, and that's not a criticism, that's just an observation, I'm sure it's covid-related and the club know his physical capacity has been affected and are rightly not broadcasting it from the rooftops. But we can all see it, right?
Go ahead, call out the players for being poor, you can start with Gini if you like, but it'll take you a few minutes to go through them all...