Garth Crooks’ Team of the Season: Erling Haaland, Phil Foden, William Saliba, Ollie Watkins, Bukayo Saka

Declan Rice (Arsenal): I can’t remember a professional footballer living with a price tag so comfortably. The sheer weight of the £105m Declan Rice cost Arsenal would have destroyed most players. However, we are dealing with a rather special individual who has improved the Gunners, and placed them in a position where they are capable of beating any team on their day.

They may not have won the title or the Champions League but they are edging closer to both with every season.

Bukayo Saka (Arsenal): I’ve no doubt that Bukayo Saka will be devastated by his team missing out on lifting the Premier League title, but hopefully his fortunes will change at Euro 2024 this summer in Germany.

Arsenal’s leading goalscorer, who was written off and racially abused by trolls on social media after missing his penalty in the Euro 2020 final shootout three years ago, has certainly come a long way since then.

Those who abused and wrote him off on that infamous evening are looking rather foolish now.

Martin Odegaard (Arsenal): Normally my player of the season goes to the best player of whichever team wins the Premier League title. However, this year I am prepared to make an exception for an exceptional player.

Martin Odegaard is more than just a professional footballer, he’s a throwback to what captains of big clubs used to be like. Outstanding player, great leader and respected by his team-mates. Odegaard is all of those things.

He has little time for the spotlight and is only interested in getting the job done. The game needs more like him.

Cole Palmer (Chelsea): I haven’t seen a player so gifted in years. The game comes so effortlessly to Cole Palmer, he makes it look easy. The 22-year-old has just picked up the Premier League’s Young Player of the Season – to sit alongside his Chelsea Player of the Year awards – and quite rightly.

To score 25 goals and have 15 assists in your first full season says volumes about this extraordinary talent. What awaits this young man is anyone’s guess, but England must accommodate this kind of special talent in a way it has failed to do so in the past.