As the 2010s edge towards their close, it seems fitting to digest the decades second tier football and analyse the star men from the period.

Picking a Championship team of the decade is an almost impossible task. Players like Ruben Neves or Adel Taarabt absolutely destroyed the league, showing themselves to be significant levels above their peers. Yet one season of magic cannot earn a place in the team of the decade.

These are the players who have extended their success past one season, albeit maybe just to two, but who have had a considerable impact on the division and demonstrated time and time again their worth at this level.

Here is the Championship Team of the Decade.

GK- Kasper Schmeichel

Being the son of Manchester United shot stopper Peter, Kasper Schmeichel had a lot to live up to. With various loan spells across the lower leagues and one spell in Scotland, Schmeichel began the decade at Leeds United where his performances earnt him a £1 million move to Leicester City.

At Leicester the Danish international flourished, gaining promotion with the Foxes in the 2013/14 season.

The 'keeper boasts 56 clean sheets in 175 Championship appearances as well as two PFA Team of the Year awards at this level. He has since gone on to earn a Premier League winners medal and come third in The Best FIFA Goalkeeper awards in 2018, further reinforcing his place as the Championship's number one goalie over the past ten years.

RB- Kieran Trippier

When the decade began Kieran Trippier, now Atletico Madrid full-back, was on the books at Manchester City and on loan at Yorkshire outfit Barnsley.

During his spell with the Tykes, Trippier won the clubs Young Player of the Year award, establishing himself as a potential talent at Championship level. His performances in Yorkshire led to Burnley signing the right-back on an initial loan but after impressing in the first half of the season the Clarets signed him in January.

Whilst at Burnley, Trippier made 132 appearances featuring in the PFA Team of the Year twice and earning promotion in the 2013/14 seasons. Trippier has gone on to represent England and was also included in the FIFA FIFPro World XI 4th team in 2018.

CB- Wes Morgan

An absolute unit at the back and another member of the Leicester City Premier League winning side, Wes Morgan began the decade playing for his boyhood club Nottingham Forest. Whilst at Forest Morgan was involved in two Championship play-offs and made the PFA Team of the Year in 2010/11.

Morgan moved to Leicester in January 2012 and is still part of their Premier League squad. With the Foxes, Morgan won promotion in the 2013/14 season and appeared in the PFA Team of the Year for a second and third time in 2012/13 and 2013/14.

Morgan captained Leicester to the Premier League title in 2015/16, scored in the Champions League in 2017 and played a significant role for Jamaica as they reached their first ever Gold Cup final in 2015.

CB- Richard Keogh

Love him or hate him, with over 400 Championship appearances this decade it's difficult to discount the impact Richard Keogh has had on the division over the past ten years. The 2010s began with Keogh playing his football for Coventry City, as the Sky Blues were relegated from the division in 2011/12. Keogh's performances however attracted interest from a host of Championship clubs with the defender ultimately signing for Derby County in summer 2012.

Since Keogh joined the Rams, the club has finished in the top half every season, qualifying for the play-offs four times and with Keogh making over 40 appearances each campaign.

In his time in the Championship this decade, Keogh has been nominated his clubs Players' Player of the Year award on five separate occasions and been including in the PFA Team of the Year in the 2014/15 season. Keogh chose to represent Republic of Ireland on the international stage, doing so in major competitions such as Euro 2016.

LB- Ryan Sessegnon

Perhaps he shouldn't qualify for the team of the decade with only two seasons of Championship football under his belt, but Ryan Sessegnon quickly set the league alight after making his debut back in 2016, aged just 16. The same week, Sessegnon became the youngest ever player to score in the Championship and the first player born in the 2000s to score a first team goal in England.

The youngster became an integral part of a Fulham team that finished 6th in the league, losing in the play-off semi-finals to Reading.

The following campaign Sessegnon continued to improve, scoring an astonishing 15 league goals, Fulham's top scorer for the season as the London side finished third and ultimately won promotion through the play-offs.

Sessegnon's brief Championship career saw him claim two successive PFA Team of the Year appearances, the Championship Player of the Year, and EFL Young Player of the Year in 2018.

Sessegnon played one Premier League season with Fulham before moving on to Tottenham Hotspur for around £25 million in summer 2019.

CDM- Ollie Norwood

Without being one of the most flashy players in the division, Northern Ireland international Ollie Norwood has made his mark on the Championship in recent years.

He began the decade still on the books of Manchester United, attempting to make a name for himself during loan spells in the lower divisions. He left United in 2012 to join Huddersfield Town and subsequently earned a reputation as one of the most reliable players in the Championship.

Norwood has accumulated forty assists over the past eight years and played over thirty times a season for each side he has represented. Impressively, Norwood achieved three successive Championship promotions from the division; with Brighton and Hove Albion in 2017, Fulham in 2018, and Sheffield United in 2019, playing a significant role for each club.

Norwood is currently enjoying his first spell of Premier League football, well deserved after more than fulfilling his duties in the division below.

CM- Pablo Hernandez

Joining Leeds United in 2016, you would have been forgiven for thinking a 31-year-old Pablo Hernandez was beyond his best years. The former Swansea City player had already enjoyed a successful career, representing Spain at international level and scoring goals in Europe for Valencia; it didn't take long for his class to ooze through at Championship level.

When Hernandez ventured to West Yorkshire, signed by his former teammate Gary Monk, he quickly took to Championship football finishing the season with six goals and eight assists despite intermittent injury issues. Hernandez has only got better as his life in Leeds has progressed. In his second year, the playmaker managed seven goals with eight assists, which was followed by a season of twelve goals and twelve assists helping Leeds to finish third in the table.

Since his debut back in 2016, no Championship player has managed more assists than the Spaniard. He has won the Leeds player of the year twice and appeared in the PFA Team of the Year on one occasion.

CM- Peter Whittingham

With over two-hundred-and-fifty appearances in the second tier this decade, the left foot of Peter Whittingham is synonymous with Championship football. Making all those appearances with Welsh outfit Cardiff City, Whittingham was for a long time one of the Championship's finest midfielders.

He began the decade with a PFA Team of the Year inclusion after scoring twenty goals from forty-one games in the 2009/10 season and carried on his scintillating form throughout the next seven years.

Whittingham went on to gather another fifty goals as well as forty-two assists securing his second and third PFA Team of the Year inclusion in 2011/12 and 2012/13 as well as earning promotion with the Bluebirds in 2012/13. In 2012 Whittingham was voted the best player outside the Premier League in FourFourTwo Magazine, clearly highlighting the midfielder's significant contribution to the division over his time spent in the second tier.

ST- Ross McCormack

With the way his Championship career has recently petered out, not to mention electrical gate issues,  Ross McCormack's immense ability at this level has been somewhat forgotten.

But a man who conjured up ninety-five goals in the division over the past ten years deserves to be remembered.

McCormack's impressive amount of Championship finishes were spread across over two-hundred-and-fifty games and four different clubs; Leeds United, Fulham, Aston Villa, and a loan spell at Nottingham Forest.

The Scottish international enjoyed his most prolific season in 2013/14 where the strikers twenty-eight goals for Leeds saw him win the Championship Golden Boot and earn an £11 million move to Fulham. The purple patch continued for McCormack with thirty-right goals in two seasons for the London-side before Villa picked him up in another £15 million move.

McCormack's honours list fails to reflect any team successes, yet on a personal level his name occurs in two PFA Team of the Year selections (2013/14 and 2015/16) as well as picking up Player of the Year awards once at Leeds and twice for Fulham.

ST- Lewis Grabban

At the time of writing, a key detail giving this player's ever-growing success rate in front of goal, Lewis Grabban has eighty-three Championship goals this decade.

The current Nottingham Forest player is well renowned as the ultimate poacher at this level of the footballing pyramid. Grabban burst onto the Championship scene with Eddie Howe's Bournemouth side back in 2013/14, making the step up from League One with apparent ease and scoring twenty-two goals in forty-four appearances, a strikers dream ratio.

The following season he reached double figures again with twelve goals for Norwich City, before enduring a tough few seasons of Premier League football.

Unable to cut it in the topflight Grabban has been tearing up the second tier on a consistent basis. In every year of Championship football played Grabban has managed to reach double figures, bar a loan spell at Reading which saw just three in sixteen. At thirty-one it appears Grabban's prolific nature is showing no signs of slowing down, with the striker leading the promotion charge in Nottingham this season.

ST- Jordan Rhodes

In a similar manner to Ross McCormack, recent years may have masked one of the Championship's most potent offensive outlets.

In the past three seasons Jordan Rhodes has mustered just fourteen league goals playing for Sheffield Wednesday and Norwich City. Yet when the striker opened up his Championship account back in 2012, no one could have foreseen just how well Rhodes was to adapt to life in the second tier.

Recently relegated from the Premier League, Blackburn Rovers splashed £8 million on Rhodes, who had recently won the League One Player of the Year with thirty-six goals in forty games for Huddersfield.

He soon repaid the Lancashire side, with twenty-seven goals in his first season. The following year saw Rhodes grab another 20+, which was replicated for the third season running the next campaign. As the goals begin to diminish Rhodes has remained at Championship level, earning promotions with Middlesbrough in 2015/16 and Norwich in 2018/19, without playing significant roles in either season.

Rhodes sits on one-hundred-and five Championship goals for the decade, an astonishing figure which still has potential to grow with the striker just 29 and chasing the play-offs with Sheffield Wednesday. 

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