Since Andy Carroll’s barnstorming performance in West Ham’s 3-0 win over Fulham last Saturday, it feels amazing to see the difference one game can make. All summer the focus has been on either just how Brendan Rodgers could get him off the books at Liverpool or how ruthlessly effective he’d be coming off the substitute’s bench.

Any remotely positive talk about Carroll as a footballer seems to have been consigned to the annals of history. People have preferred to focus on his fallings, his transfer fee and what the big number nine can’t do; as opposed to what he can.

So although the sight of Carroll causing all round carnage in the claret and blue of West Ham came as a surprise to some, the truth is that there’s no reason why he shouldn’t excel in East London. Plenty of clichés have been wheeled out about Sam Allardyce’s almost fabled style of pragmatism and in some respects that will help him succeed. But more importantly than anything, he is at a club where he feels loved, backed and will receive long, hard game-time. And for any footballer, there can be no more important feeling.

Throughout the last 18 months, every pub, terrace or kitchen conversation about the pony-tailed frontman, has struggled to co-exist without uttering the figure of £35million. With any footballer, it’s only natural to bring their transfer fee into play, but with Carroll, there has always been a lingering sense of injustice. His record switch from Newcastle United to Liverpool in the January of 2011 was beyond even the most vivid distortions of today’s transfer market and it has never been a fair barometer as which to measure him by.

Few players in European football of any level are worth the riches that Newcastle demanded and it was by no means his fault that Liverpool caved in to that ransom. But just because he wasn’t worth such a ridiculous amount of money doesn’t necessitate that he isn’t a good footballer.

If Carroll was coming into a star-studded team playing efficient and effective football, as you might expect when a club shells out that sort of money, maybe things could have turned out a little differently. But despite a decent spell of form towards the end of the 2010-11 season, the second coming of Kenny Dalglish never really took off the ground. Last season saw Liverpool generally struggle to find any form of fluidity to their team and Carroll was arguably the biggest looser as a result.

As the team struggled to adopt to an effective style of play, it was Carroll who appeared to struggle the most, especially as his mooted partnership with the talismanic Luis Suarez failed to get off the ground. But just because things were struggling to work out for him in the red half of Merseyside, it didn’t constitute the need for obituaries to be written over his career.

Sometimes, things simply don’t work out at football clubs. Whether the style of play doesn’t suit a player or a striking partnership fails to instigate the chemistry it needs, it can’t always be a success story. But to doubt Carroll’s abilities as a footballer are of a serious misjudgment.

Because as he showed towards the end of last season and indeed back during his time in Tyneside, he hasn’t lost the tools needed to be a great striker in this league. Some may argue that the outpouring of praise that has come from Carroll’s cameo at Upton Park on Saturday is something of a kneejerk reaction, but that simply isn’t true.

People seem to be so overtly critical of Andy Carroll simply because he possesses the traits that suit the merits of an alternative way of playing football. As the modern game leans towards the merits of the sort of possession based, short passing game that Brendan Rodgers is ironically looking to develop at Anfield, it’s as if Carroll seems to provoke prejudice because he’s not particularly suited to that way of playing.

But there is more than one way than playing football and what could be Liverpool’s loss may well be West Ham’s gain. Of course, if he was to spearhead a quick, high pressing game in attack, he isn’t likely to look particularly effective in any capacity. But that doesn’t for five minutes mean he should be considered as some ‘plan b’ to sit on the bench at Anfield. He might not be worth £35million but he is certainly worth having a team built around him. Maybe not at Liverpool, but that shouldn’t count against him.

The furor surrounding Carroll’s performance against Fulham may be kneejerk and in some ways, it was slightly overactive; but only from an individual perspective. His aerial ability and physicality really are remarkable and you cannot help but marvel at the amount of aerial duels he seems to come out on top in. But against Fulham, Carroll only won nine of his 15 aerial battles. Yet that wasn’t where the effectiveness lay.

His presence and almost aura seemed to galvanize Sam Allardyce’s team. Even if you take away the fact that he sill came out on top of Brede Hangeland – one of the most formidable aerial competitors in the league – he seemed to catalyze the rest of the team. For West Ham’s first, it was Carroll’s knock on to Ricardo Vaz Te that teed up Kevin Nolan for his first. For the third, it was again, Carroll’s tangling with Hangeland in the build up that saw Matty Taylor bury the loose ball.

His ability as a goal scorer hasn’t been exhibited too much in recent months, but make no mistake, Carroll still has it in his locker. West Ham will benefit hugely from his aerial prowess both attackingly and defensively but that doesn’t mean they can’t add variety to their game. He isn’t half as bad technically as what many like to make out and although he might not instigate slick counter attacks with a one touch flick, he can still hold the ball up and keep the game flowing on the deck.  Allardyce’s game naturally caters towards the big diagonal ball and meticulous percentage-play but that doesn’t mean they can’t mix it up and be devoid of all aesthetics. Carroll can be at the crux of that.

Perhaps it’s been so long since we’ve seen Andy Carroll in full flow, that we’ve actually forgot his merits as a footballer as opposed to an item of unfair ridicule. But it is the big Geordie and his new London club that could be having the last laugh come the end of the season. There’s nothing kneejerk about Carroll’s ability – certainly not in a side that are finally willing to cater to his needs.

How do you rate Andy Carroll’s prospects at West Ham? Have you never been in doubt of his specialist skill set or do you feel he still doesn’t have enough to make a sustained impact in the Premier League? Let me know how you see it on Twitter: follow @samuel_antrobus and bat me all your Carroll based opinions. 

[ad_pod id=’dfp-mpu’ align=’right’]