“He has the turning circle of a cruise liner”: Pochettino slammed for playing Spurs ace out of position

Posted by

Sometimes a manager moving a player to a different position can make them look like a tactical genius. Think Thierry Henry being moved to centre forward or whoever changed Harry Kane from a keeper to a striker. 

This isn’t always the case, it can sometimes look obvious that someone just doesn’t suit a certain role and this was the case for Spurs on Tuesday night.

Davinson Sanchez was deployed as a right-back in the 2-2 draw against Olympiacos and it didn’t work out. Thisisfutbol.com reported on some comments made by a journalist about the Colombian’s performance.

READ MORE: Video: Red Star live up to Stephen Warnock calling them part-timers with shocking defending for Lewandowski goal

Alasdair Gold was speaking in a YouTube video when he said: “He’s a big, bulky Colombian centre-back who really has the turning circle of a cruise liner. He absolutely can’t deal with fast wingers coming down that flank. He just really struggles to deal with pace and a bit of trickery.”

He went on to say: “You get the flipside of that that he’s got no attacking intent whatsoever. I watched during the warm-up, they were doing crossing drills and his crosses were lacking in confidence, they were either low crosses that weren’t going to anyone or crosses that were so high at the back post that no one had any chance of getting to them.”

Not a natural right back it seems

You still fancy Spurs to have enough to get the better of Red Star Belgrade and Olympiacos over the course of the group, but it looks like Bayern Munich should run out easy winners overall. That could be vital as Spurs would face an unseeded draw if they do go through.

Kyle Walker-Peters was an unused sub on the bench which doesn’t look like great news for his future at the club either. He’s a natural full-back with decent first team experience so surely he would have done a better job there than Sanchez.

It’s one poor result so it’s not a total disaster for Spurs, if they beat Bayern in the next game things will be looking rosy again. Despite that, it will be interesting to see where Sanchez lines up the next time he plays.

More Stories Davinson Sanchez Mauricio Pochettino