Pardew hails 'manager's dream' Noble
The last thing Alan Pardew wants is to increase expectations about the arrival of a bright new West Ham talent on the Premiership stage.
But after teenager Mark Noble’s impressive top-flight debut in Sunday’s 1-1 draw at Tottenham it was tough for even the Hammers’ manager to hold back with the superlatives.
Noble, 18, born within cheering distance of Upton Park, won a gritty midfield duel with Dutch veteran Edgar Davids after earning Pardew’s vote to replace injured captain Nigel Reo-Coker.
And although it was finally England Under-21 defender Anton Ferdinand - another product of the club’s youth academy – who provided the last-gasp equaliser, it was Noble’s stunning performance at White Hart Lane which really caught the eye.
Now, after just 13 games in last season’s Championship promotion push, he has almost certainly earned himself a crack at Manchester United at Upton Park this coming Sunday.
Pardew said: “For me the battle he had with Davids was one of the highlights of the game at Tottenham.
“He over-played a bit in the first half and was caught out a couple of times.
“But he went out there in the second half and said ‘My name is Mark Noble and I’m here to play, too’.
“I don’t want to hype him up too much but in the second half Mark started to show his potential.
“He rattled Davids. You could see that, but it’s very difficult for me to speak about him because I’m such an admirer of the lad, not just as a footballer but also as a young person, too.”
At six feet tall and 12 stone, Noble mixes technical ability with a physical presence.
He is a box-to-box midfielder with a finishing touch and a natural vision. At Tottenham he was unlucky to have a "goal" disallowed for offside.
“He really is a manager’s dream,” said Pardew.
“For a start, you just can’t get him off the training ground. He’s a fantastic lad and we’ve always looked at him in a special way.”
With Reo-Coker likely to be out for up to six weeks, the easy option for Pardew would have been to pick Scotland’s Christian Dailly against Tottenham.
“But I decided to replace an attacking midfielder like-for-like,” said the manager, “and in the end it looked the right decision.
“Mark’s time has come now because of Nigel’s injury. It’s up to him to hold down his place from here and if he can it could say quite a bit about our future.
“Yes, he over-played a bit at the start and I admit I began to think to myself that I might have to look at him around the 60-minute mark and see if he needed replacing.
“But he’s a clever, clever player and by the time the hour mark arrived he had settled in and I didn’t have any worries about him whatsoever.”
Even though Ferdinand’s last-gasp equaliser was practically the last action of a frenetic London derby, West Ham certainly deserved their point after trailing to a goal by Tottenham’s Egyptian striker Mido from the 16th minute onwards.
There was rancour on and off the pitch with West Ham’s former Tottenham striker Teddy Sheringham in a wrestling match with Davids after a late challenge by the Dutchman in the first half. Both were booked.
And West Ham fans chanted tasteless abuse at the uncompromising Mido who put himself about on the pitch after heading the home side in front.
Surprisingly, it was not until the closing minutes that referee Alan Wiley booked Mido following a string of dubious challenges.
Now the Football Association are waiting for reports to determine whether they should take action against West Ham for their supporters’ behaviour.
