We had a very interesting comment on the site yesterday – it suggested our 6/10 rating for Filip Helander was wrong, on the following basis:

“Helander is obviously quality. Messi would have looked s*** in those conditions today. Hollander [sic] strolled it.”

This is a very curious rebuttal, because we were hardly scathing of Helander, more observant of the fact he was a little rusty, but did manage an outstanding assist and a (messy) goal regardless.

And yet, the poster suggested the weather would have made Lionel Messi look like Lionel Blair.

So our question is why Jones, Defoe and Aribo all stood out classes apart while others struggled?

Why did the weather not turn their performances into complete and total mince too?

We do wonder why it is that some fans seek to excuse mediocrity on grounds of who the player is rather than actually judging what the player has directly done – we’ve rated Greg Docherty so highly over the years, but yesterday he was poor and didn’t take his chance. And we called that.

But Aribo, Jones and Defoe showed that even hellish weather won’t stop class rising to the surface.

In terms of Helander – he didn’t do a tonne wrong, but most of his game was passing it short to Edmundson or Halliday – punctuated by his goal and his assist. To argue he ‘strolled’ the game seems a little far-fetched and slightly generous to us, but it is all about opinions.

We do look forward to seeing Helander in the future, when he doesn’t have to face a terrible pitch, stodgy opponents and horrific weather, but given the form of Katic and Goldson he faces a bit of a wait to get a run.

Still, nice to have a £3M Sweden international in reserve, eh?