There have been reports this week that Jay Emanuel-Thomas, commonly known as JET, is attracting interest from both Fulham and QPR of the Premier League. On the face of it this story seems perfectly plausible, as most fans have deemed JET as one of the team’s top players currently.
The young forward has been a bright spark in the Ipswich side of late and at times has been the only real threat when others have been below par. Needless to say, the former Arsenal man has a lot of talent and if he keeps on improving he could be Ipswich’s key man next season. All of this is even more impressive considering the former Arsenal man is only 21 years old.
With the exception of Giovani dos Santos, it has been years since Ipswich have had a tricky forward like JET to bring flair and excitement into games; a player with the attributes of dos Santos or JET has been something that fans have been screaming out for in previous seasons. Often, the players put out wide show no real signs of flair and have no real ability when it comes to running at defenders so JET is a rare breed and it could be argued that he is the team’s most valuable commodity. However, if you told all this to an Ipswich fan in December they probably would have thought you were insane.
By just watching JET’s recent performances you do not see the complete story of his Ipswich Town career. When the young forward came to the club in July 2011 for a fee rumoured to be just over a million pounds, many expected top performances from the word go and were massively disappointed.
JET didn’t seem half the player he was built up to be at the start of the season and only really started to justify his place in the squad from January onwards. In hindsight, those disappointing displays could be put down to factors such as needing time to settle at his new club and needing time to gel with his team mates.
Regardless, the fact is that JET has only really played consistently well for 3-4 months and even then he hasn’t performed to standards that would be expected of him in the Premier League. It has been a pleasure to see JET run furiously at defenders, nipping in-between them and creating chances from nothing but there is still something missing from his game; the final delivery has not always been there for JET and a lot of the time he finds himself creating great chances only to throw them away needlessly. His composure is something that will hopefully improve next season and if so, it looks like he could well live up to the hype or even surpass these high expectations.
On the other hand, it possible that everyone has got a bit too far ahead of themselves and has started to over-rate the young forward. So often in football we see young players get over rated and the weight of this expectation has a devastating effect. I would certainly be shocked if a Premier League club were to make a move for him, mostly because he hasn’t played well for long enough to prove he is the real deal. It is probably true that a few clubs have sent scouts to watch JET and are monitoring his situation but nothing more.
This isn’t exactly breaking news though; Premier League clubs probably send out scouts to nearly every football league game just to ensure they aren’t missing out on any hidden gems, especially to a club like Ipswich who have sold on players like Darren Bent and Connor Wickham to the Premier League in recent time. I find it hard to take this transfer rumour seriously and it is probably just a result of a slow week in the press. In regards to JET, he looks like he has some fantastic potential and hopefully will channel any media attention into positive performances.
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