F365 Features

From those who have fallen a long way, to those who didn't actually have that far to fall, there are plenty of players that you might think 'Are they still around?' Here are ten of those unfortunates...

10 - Nigel Quashie
The other players on this list had a way to fall, but relegation enthusiast Quashie 'makes the cut' because of the depths he has sunk to at West Ham. For that's where he is still contracted, in case you'd forgotten. Last seen making three unspectacular appearances while on loan at Wolves last season, Quashie has now apparently (and this is according to a certain Sunday tabloid prone to hyperbole, so take it as you will) been totally frozen out by Gianfranco Zola, and has been told in no uncertain terms to stay the hell away from the team, the stadium, the training ground, the tea lady - the lot. And this in a team with no pot to p**s in, without two pennies to rub together and with a playing staff thinner than Peter Crouch's pinkie. Bad times for Nigel.

9 - Micah Richards
When he broke into the Manchester City first team a couple of years ago, mouths watered at the prospect of this strong, quick and massively talented defender who could play in a few positions across the back four. 'A future England captain,' we thought, 'He'll be better in the centre of defence,' we were told. However, in the past season or so he has stagnated, so much so that Pablo Zabaleta is now Mark Hughes' preferred choice at right-back, while around £35million was spent on centre-backs last summer. Fabio Capello doesn't fancy him either, and though he still has plenty of time to live up to his potential, it's been a curious decline.

8 - Paolo Ferreira
One of Jose Mourinho's first purchases after he joined Chelsea in 2004, it seems remarkable that they paid Porto around £12million for the right-back, even if you take the Abramovich tax into account. Now, Ferreira is probably the fourth, perhaps fifth-choice right-back at Stamford Bridge behind Jose Bosingwa, Juliano Belletti and Branislav Ivanovic, with Michael Essien arguably a better option if he wasn't needed in midfield. It is probably only his ability to fill in at left-back that has kept him at Chelsea, and one imagines that this situation will not persist for long.

7 - Martin Petrov
We're big fans of the Bulgarian flyer here at Football365, but it seems that circumstances are against him this season. He missed the start of the season due to injuries, and a combination of further niggles and the unexpected form of Craig Bellamy on the flank of City's attack has left him an increasingly frustrated figure. He says he wants to stay at Eastlands, but he's 30 and as a winger, he doesn't have too many more years left. Perhaps he should seek a regular gig in January.

6 - Zoran Tosic
Sure, Alex Ferguson purchased the Serbian winger as a prospect, but aside from a couple of not terribly convincing appearances in cups League and FA, Tosic has been a ghost at Old Trafford. And this at a time when the wide positions at United are up for grabs. Tosic is obviously viewed as one for the future, but it seems odd that he has been given so little chance since moving to Manchester in January. In any case, the Da Silva brothers were bought with similar eyes on times to come last summer, but they've chalked up more than two dozen appearances in positions where United are positively flush.

5 - Benni McCarthy
Scorer of 13 goals last season and 36 at a rate of slightly worse than one every other start since joining Blackburn, this season looked like it would be perfect for McCarthy. Roque Santa Cruz gone, Jason Roberts possibly on the decline, new strikers yet to settle in - one would have thought that the South African would have nailed down a place in the side. Not so. McCarthy has only started once in the league and looks to be on his way out of Ewood Park in January.

4 - Giovani dos Santos
In truth, alarm bells should have been ringing loudly when Barcelona let the man once known as the next Ronaldinho go so easily, and for a mere £4.7million in 2008. A year and a half and two starts later, and the bargain is starting to look like a rip-off. The Mexican has a reputation as something of a nightlife connoisseur, so perhaps bringing him to the land of Faces wasn't the brightest idea in the world, but even if he's developed a taste for the classier hotspots of Essex, his form has been desperately disappointing. He impressed in spells while on loan at Ipswich last season, but it's quite a fall from the great hope of Barcelona to the nether regions of the Championship.

3 - Benjani
You could fill this list with dregs from the Manchester City reserves (Valeri Bojinov is just astoundingly unlucky rather than forgotten), but the Zimbabwean has seen less action than a eunuch monk in recent times, partly due to a series of injuries but also because of the lashings and lashings of cash splashed on City's other attacking options. A move either on loan or permanently to Hull or even back to Pompey has been mooted, but at the moment Benjani is persona non grata at the club that made such a fuss of signing him in January 2008.

2 - David Bentley
There's a particularly sweary Spurs fan in F365 Towers who often gets quite worked up about his team, and casually chucks around Fs and Cs like confetti in the wind. However, even by his standards, dockers, pimps and Australians would have blushed at the language that spouted forth from his potty mouth during the recent north London derby. And even with Tottenham's calamitous defending, Bentley was the target of his ire. Bentley was handed an ideal opportunity to reclaim a first-team spot, but blew it in style, producing a performance that impressively combined both unreasonable arrogance and torpor, the nadir of which was a ridiculous attempt to reprise his 40-yard dipper of last season's corresponding fixture, with inevitably hilarious results. One imagines it will be back to the bench and kicking footballs into skips for Bentley.

1 - Sanli Tuncay
We've been accused of having a bit of an obsession with Tuncay, but we genuinely believe he's one of the most underrated players in the world, never mind the Premier League. That's why we were delighted when he left Middlesborough to stay in the Premier League last summer, even if it was for Stoke. However, it hasn't exactly gone to plan, finding himself on the bench for the majority of his time at City, the nadir coming when he was the man sacrificed after Abdoulaye Faye was sent off at Hull the other week, despite only being on the pitch for six minutes.

It doesn't seem to be anyone's fault either. Tony Pulis has a system that works, with James Beattie providing the perfect foil for Ricardo Fuller up front, leaving the most talented member of the Stoke squad twiddling his thumbs on the sidelines. One imagines that the Turk is not the sort to sulk and demand a move this instant, but it must be a deeply frustrating situation.

Nick Miller