After Pep's praise for Walker and Rose, we decided to list the top tier's leading wide-defensive partnerships...
Gary Neville and Denis Irwin, Manchester United
Patrice Evra is arguably the best of Manchester United’s Premier League-era full-backs, but he never developed a long-standing partnership like Denis Irwin and Gary Neville.
Irwin and Neville – whose consistent presence became synonymous with Manchester United in the late ‘90s – won five Premier League titles, and the Champions League, in the seven seasons that they were regularly in tandem.
The two, of course, were different stylistically.
Irwin was more attacking, a set-piece specialist and often designated penalty-taker – scoring 20 goals in the said seven seasons – and was ambidextrous, too.
Neville did develop an attacking rapport with David Beckham, but was the less adventurous of the two, perhaps more responsible for the fact that United’s defensive record was the best in the Premier League in three of those seven campaigns.
Both remarkably consistent performers, though, the duo flew the flag for reliable full-backs at both ends of the pitch.
Lauren and Ashley Cole, Arsenal
The pair’s contribution to the history-making invincibles means that Lauren and Ashley Cole edge out Lee Dixon and Nigel Winterburn as Arsenal’s offering to this list.
Flanking Sol Campbell and Kolo Toure, the 2003/04 Gunners kept 15 clean sheets and conceded just 26 goals on the way to going an entire league season unbeaten.
That neither started out as full-backs is impressive, too, and presumably responsible for their technical proficiency.
Lauren was initially unhappy that after signing for Arsenal as a central midfielder, Arsene Wenger soon went about transforming him into a right-back.
Cole, meanwhile, was a striker at youth level.
The defensive protection offered to Robert Pires and Freddie Ljungberg in both the 2001/02 and 2003/04 title-winning efforts was vital in allowing the midfield pair to blossom.
But five assists between Lauren and Cole in the 2003/04 campaign proved their versatility.
Seamus Coleman and Leighton Baines, Everton
A David Moyes creation, but Everton fans saw the best of Seamus Coleman and Leighton Baines under Roberto Martinez.
The Spaniard, perhaps naively, left his full-backs free to maraud, and, initially at least, was rewarded.
Coleman scored five goals and Baines netted six in the 2013/14 season, with the former running the furthest of any Everton player that season.
Baines, meanwhile, was Roy Hodgson’s first-choice left-back by the time that the 2014 World Cup came around.
He registered nine assists in the subsequent 2014/15 Premier League campaign, too.
Their prolific partnership is still going, and Everton are still profiting.
As recently as the weekend just gone, Coleman scored a crucial winner at Crystal Palace as a result of a trademark attacking run, his fourth of the season and 18th in his Premier League career.
Baines, the league’s third-highest scoring defender ever, has 30 top-tier goals, largely a result from his pure left foot and excellence from the penalty spot.
When both are at their best, Everton are a powerful attacking force.
Gary Kelly and Ian Harte, Leeds United
Only one uncle has shared a Premier League pitch with his nephew in Premier League history.
They just happen to have been teammates for club and country for eight years and contributed to a legendary period for Leeds United.
Alan Smith, Lee Bowyer, Rio Ferdinand and Mark Viduka are names that roll off the tongue when assessing Leeds’ late ‘90s and early noughties success, but Gary Kelly and Ian Harte were ever-presents.
Both Irishmen featured throughout United’s run to the UEFA Cup semi-final in 2000, and were first-choice for much of the next season’s Champions League campaign, too – though Kelly lost his place to Danny Mills for quarter-final and semi-final matches against Deportivo and Valencia.
Much like Neville and Irwin, the pair complemented each other well.
Kelly, Harte’s uncle, was an industrious, dogged defender.
His nephew, meanwhile, had an artistic way with set-pieces, scoring six goals in the 1999/2000 campaign, and seven the following year.
That they played together for the Republic of Ireland at the 2002 World Cup rounds off the achievements of a vastly underrated partnership.
Kyle Walker and Danny Rose, Tottenham Hotspur
The pair crowned by Pep Guardiola on Saturday as “unstoppable…the best full-backs in the league.”
Perhaps the Manchester City boss was batting his eyelashes ahead of a play for the pair this summer, but his words carried weight.
Kyle Walker and Danny Rose are relentless.
Technically, they are much improved, but the leg-work they get through means that they are invaluable at both ends of the pitch.
In attack, they have eradicated the need for Mauricio Pochettino to field wingers. Walker has six assists in this campaign, while Rose has set up three and scored two himself.
Rose has made the eighth-most tackles in the league so far this season, meanwhile, with Walker 25th on that list.
Rarely do teams tactically aim to accentuate their full-backs’ strengths, but Walker and Rose have left their manager with little choice.
