Rick Rant - The Case of Central Midfield.

I am writing this after the Man Utd away match, full of disappointment, confusion and anger.

I think like most Spurs fans, I was surprised and disappointed to see the two central midfield positions occupied by Winks and Sissoko. This is a midfield pairing that Poch used repeatedly in his final months and proved, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that it just doesn't work.

Don't get me wrong, a lot of players looked out of sorts, Kane and Sanchez too name but two, but the central midfield pairing were non existent.

The role of central midfielder is a vital one, perhaps the most vital in a football team. The defenders defend and clear the ball to the midfielders. The strikers rely on the midfielders for service. The full-backs rely on the midfielders for cover if they go forward. The strikers rely on the midfielders to recycle lost possession, to maintain an attack. It is very hard to find an individual player that is good at all those things, so what you do, is put a midfield pairing together, that can accomplish all those tasks.

Winks and Sissoko have their own positives and negatives, the problem is, each of their positives and negatives are not a good pairing. Almost every time they are paired, our central midfield becomes non existent. They do not read each and they are always in the wrong positions. Neither of them is good at holding onto the ball to give others time and space. Sissoko in particular constantly passes the back backward immediately to the player that passes him the ball, and therefore invites pressure on that player because the opposing players know exactly what he's going to do.

Winks on the other hand is a great forward thinking player, he makes runs and good passes but his recovery runs, tracking back and tackling leaves a lot to be desired. If you then complement a forward minded player, with a player that covers all the time, you end up with an empty central midfield when possession is lost.

I am not just saying this because of my thorough dislike of Sissoko. I have said this before, his effort and commitment are unmatched in our squad. The problem I have with him is his technical ability. If he has to touch the ball more than twice when he has possession, he will either lose possession, pass to a player that will then lose possession or kick the ball out of play. He is a lower mid-table premiership player at best and is not of the required standard for our squad. We win games despite him, not because of him. His goal against Bournemouth was a good one though (one touch).

I would hope that Mourinho learned a valuable lesson today and, unlike Poch, will never deploy Winks and Sissoko in the those positions on the same team at the same time again. I would imagine and hope that it was only deployed this time because of injury and fitness doubts to other players. The fact that both were subbed off, Winks through injury, Sissoko through being crap, highlights the problem we have in those positions.

Rick - COYS