Patrick Bamford, A name that’s more associated in League One
and in the Championship. Bamford started his career at my local football team,
Nottingham Forrest, where he made his debut coming on as a substitute on the 31st
of December, in a 0-1 home defeat to Cardiff City. He also appeared in the dying
minutes against Ipswich in the following match, which was his only first team appearances
for Forest, however Bamford flourished at youth level with Forest, scoring 5
goals and assisting 3 in a 9-1 victory over Wigan in the F.A Youth Cup. In the
following game he managed to get himself on the score sheet again four times in
another 5-1 hammering against Southampton. Later that month, in January,
Bamford was snapped up by Chelsea for a fee of £1.5 million and on his debut,
in the reserves he, scored two goals where one was the winner in a 5-4 win
against Gillingham.
Later that year, Chelsea loaned Bamford to MK Dons where he
made an instant impact, where on his debut he contributed with 3 assists. In
the end Bamford stayed at MK Dons for the reminder of the 2012-13 season, but
was hampered by injury which only led him to make 14 appearances and end the
season on 4 goals.
For the 2013-14 season, Bamford was loaned back to MK Dons
for another 6 months. Bamford scored 14 league goals in an impressive 23
appearances, and by the end of his 6 months at MK Dons, Bamford had made 30
appearances scoring 17 goals in all competitions. Furthermore in total he made 44
appearances and managed to get on the score sheet on 21 occasions, thus linking
himself with a move to a bigger club, which would be Derby County. Once at
Derby, Bamford didn’t waste any time getting on score sheet, it took Bamford two matches coming on as a sub
against Brighton & Hove Albion where he played 21 times in the Championship
scoring 8 goals, but in total ended the 2013-14 season with 53 appearances and
finding the back of the net 26 times.
The 2014-15 season was where Bamford really took it to the
next level. He signed a loan deal with Middlesbrough for 6 months, where in the
third round of the League Cup, Bamford coolly slotted home a penalty to level
the proceeding against Liverpool in a 2-2 draw, which went to penalties. Unfortunately
Bamford missed his penalty, which was saved by Simon Mignolet, but converted
one in sudden death as Middlesbrough went out 14-13 on penalties. Bamford had
found a bit of form at the end of November and going into December scored 4
goals in 5 matches. He continued to make an impact in the Championship against his
former club Derby County, where he scored within 6 minutes which moved
Middlesbrough into second place, and gave them a 2-0 victory. In January, after seeing this, Chelsea
decided to keep Bamford where he was, and extended his loan till the end of the
season.
Later that month, against Manchester City in the 4th round
of the F.A Cup, Bamford scored the opening goal in a 2-0 away victory at the
Eithad. On the 3rd April, Bamford scored his 17th goal of
the season, which lifted Middlesbrough to the top of the Championship. Bamford
ended with 43 appearances and scored 19, where he was Middlesbrough’s top goal
scorer, where 17 of those came in the Championship and 1 each in the League and
F.A Cup. In addition, his performances didn’t go unnoticed as he was awarded
the Football League Championship Player of the Year.
With Bamford now proven himself in League 1 and the Championship,
he’s now been given his first big chance to perform on the big stage in the
Premier League, where he has moved to Crystal Palace on a season-long
loan. For me if Bamford hits 10 goals in
the Premier League, I’d say he would have had a successful season. If he were
to achieve this, then there’d be 3 very happy people, one been Bamford himself,
the second Alan Pardew and finally Jose Mourinho.
Thanks for reading
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