At Blurrt, we collect all the social media conversation surrounding Premier League players and have found a number of stories you may have missed from another weekend of top class action. The best part is that all of these stories can be found within 5 minutes using our incredible Sports Hub!
Mendy Makes Headlines
Benjamin Mendy received the highest Blurrt score possible (10) this weekend despite not even taking the field against Stoke! The Manchester City left-back is out for the foreseeable future with an injury, but he is supporting his side all the same via his social media account. His ravings about team-mate Kevin de Bruyne on Twitter gave fans an insight into just how integrated the French defender is at his new club. De Bruyne was on fire as City put 7 past Stoke and also scored 10 on the Blurrt score, but Mendy’s online presence made more of an impact than many of the players who actually graced Premier League pitches this weekend!
De bruyne has more assists in one game than most of us in entire career 😂😂😂 too good
— Benjamin Mendy (@benmendy23) October 14, 2017
Mendy has also started #SharkTeam. As a non-Manchester City fan, I have no idea what it means, but it appears to be some sort of message of support for him during his injury. Still, it seems to be catching on with City fans. Here’s what the “top images” section looked like:
De Gea Impresses
Liverpool and Manchester United couldn’t be separated on Saturday lunchtime, as the Reds and Red Devils drew 0-0. United keeper David de Gea had an outstanding game, making some key saves including one world class stop from Joel Matip. Positivity surrounding the Spanish stopper soared as a result, with an increase in week-on-week positivity of 59%!
He was also the most talked about player of the weekend, with 54,249 tweets sent about him during the match.
Ozil Incites Anger
Arsenal’s creative midfielder came in for plenty of criticism again after his side fell to a poor 2-1 defeat against Watford. The German star missed a good chance and generally struggled to impact the game in a positive way, leading to a negative reaction from fans on social media. Conversation surrounding him was 65% negative, but emotional responses looked even worse for him: 69% of emotion-bearing tweets were angry, with a further 4% demonstrating disgust.
Zaha and Per Hit Hot Streak
This weekend was great for our “Hot or Not” section of the Hub, as Per Mertesacker returned to the Arsenal team for the first time since 2016 and scored and Wilfried Zaha finished off Chelsea on his return from injury. Mertesacker saw the conversation surrounding him rise by 9,367%, whilst Zaha was talked about 8,908% more. Tom Cleverley scored the winning goal for Watford, earning him an 8,136% increase in conversation! David de Gea and Matteo Darmian rounded out the top 5, with de Gea’s conversation levels increasing by 7,562% and Darmian’s increasing by 4,890%.
Team of the Week
Players from Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal and the two Manchester clubs dominated the team of the week for Game Week 8. Mendy was the most talked about defender, with Manchester City team mate Kevin de Bruyne topping the table when it came to midfielders. Rival club Manchester United had the most talked about striker, with Romelu Lukaku leading the line and dominating the conversation over the weekend. His poor performance generated plenty of talking points and the debate about him going missing in big games flared up again.
With so much interesting activity on Twitter during the football weekend, it’s easy to miss some of the smaller stories. From Mendy’s shark obsession to Ozil’s angry following, our Sports Hub brings all these stories to the foreground. If you want to find out more about our incredible Hub, get in touch with Ali at alistair@blurrt.co.uk