My Sporting Lowdown

by Chris Only one Estonian had ever previously played in the Premier League. Mart Poom, who played for Derby, Sunderland and Arsenal, made 138 appearances between the sticks in England's top division.  Although he did score once for Sunderland in a lower division, Poom never hit the back of the net in the Premier League, understandably because he was a goalkeeper. That means that on the first day of a blooming 2018 at a foggy and murky Turf Moor, on the end of an Oxlade-Chamberlain free kick and a Dejan Lovren flick-on, the bundling 89th minute winner from Ragnar Klavan, affectionately known as 'Raggy', became the Premier League's first Estonian goalscorer. Born in 1985, the Estonia skipper began playing in central midfield in his junior levels. Football was in his blood, as his father Dzintar represented Estonia internationally also, having a career within Estonia with Flora Tallinn and several other clubs within the Baltic nation. He said la...

by Chris Back in the day, the dawn of the Sporting Lowdown, the second article ever written on here, the dinosaur days, I wrote a little bit on the England Squad I would take to Russia next year. And, as time does, it changes the opinions of the opinionated. Here is the updated thoughts which I think see to all upturns and downturns of potential England internationals. Goalkeepers 1: Jordan PICKFORD ( Everton F.C. ) Caps : 1 2017/18 apps : 25 My pick for number 1 in the previous article was Jack Butland. Of course, he hasn't had a terribly poor season, but as we all know, Stoke haven't had the usually solid 9th place finish which we've all got so used to. Jordan Pickford and Everton's seasons, since the previous time of writing,  have most definitely taken a U-turn from competing with Stoke in the bottom three, to now chasing the 7th spot behind the inevitable big six. Pickford's excellent distribution is possibly his strongest attribut...