Jermaine Jenas singled out Christian Eriksen for criticism after the Tottenham star’s performance in the draw with Olympiakos on Wednesday night.
Spurs surrendered a two-goal lead in Greece in their opening outing in the Champions League this season and ultimately had to settle for a point.
That will have been a major disappointment for Mauricio Pochettino considering the dominant position that they got themselves into, but ultimately they couldn’t hold out and will feel as though it’s two points dropped away from home.
While others impressed, Jenas wasn’t best pleased with Eriksen’s performance on the night and made that clear in his assessment of the game while working as a pundit for BT Sport.
“He’s unrecognisable tonight,” Jenas told BT Sport, as quoted by the Daily Mail. “He’s had a couple of moments where the manager has had a look and you can tell he’s thinking “we need to get him off here.”
“You have bad games as players, he has had many great games for Tottenham over the years but he’s sticking out like a sore thumb with how bad he is playing tonight.
“He’s getting the simple things wrong and that’s the worrying thing. He just looks shattered.”
As noted by the Metro, the Danish international was heavily paired with an exit this past summer as there was intense speculation of a move to Real Madrid.
That ultimately failed to materialise, and so it’s questionable as to whether perhaps the disappointment of not getting a move to Spain is still playing on his mind and affecting his performances on the pitch.
Uncharacteristically, Eriksen has contributed just one goal and no assists in six appearances so far this season, and that will be an ongoing concern for Pochettino as he’ll need his creative star to get back to his best to at least help them until January before the window opens again.
Jenas clearly believes that Eriksen is struggling currently, and time will tell whether or not that results in him being dropped for the benefit of the team in the coming weeks if he can’t produce.
