da jogodeouro： If the transfer window had ended last week, Tottenham wouldn’t be the healthiest looking football club. But a late flurry saw the club make four signings in the final few days of the window to make everything look a little bit healthier.
da fazobetai： Two stand out.
Whilst Davinson Sanchez and Juan Foyth have arrived at the club and seem to fit with Mauricio Pochettino’s image as a manager, the other two don’t quite so much. Serge Aurier had to appeal a Home Office decision to exclude him from the UK before he was able to join up with the north London club this week, whilst Fernando Llorente has become the first outfield player older than 30 to sign for Spurs while Pochettino has been the manager.
But if both signings seem like outliers, that might be part of the appeal. Since losing Kyle Walker, Spurs have struggled to break down defences. That doesn’t tell the whole story, and there are plenty of other reasons why Pochettino’s side struggled at Newcastle until Jonjo Shelvey’s red card, lost to Chelsea and drew with Burnley at home.
But one small part in the problem is Kieran Trippier’s inability to get in behind defences to place those pinpoint crosses which saw many Spurs fans treat the departure of Walker as no big deal. The arrival of Aurier, however, will give a similar attacking verve to the Englishman who went north to join up with Pep Guardiola at Manchester City.
Aurier’s talent has never been in doubt, of course. But it’s his attitude which seems to be at odds with Pochettino’s squad mentality, which emphasises the collective over the individual. After making obscene comments about his former manager Laurent Blanc and teammate Zlatan Ibrahimovic on a Periscope live-stream, the Ivorian full-back’s image was damaged – probably irreparably so. It was further tarnished when he was charged with assaulting a police officer outside a Paris nightclub. He always maintained his innocence.
But perhaps coming to a new environment, away from his Parisian home, where old friends were perhaps to blame for leading him astray, will focus his mind on football rather than anything else, and if that’s the case, Spurs could really do with his talent in a position where only Trippier and the young Kyle Walker-Peters were available to the manager.
The other deadline day signing might prove to be the most important, though. That’s the capture of Fernando Llorente.
It’s an odd signing in some ways. His age and his style of play don’t necessarily scream Pochettino player. He isn’t the most mobile of centre forwards, and his bulk and 32-year-old frame mean that the sort of high pressing that Spurs are known for might be beyond the Spaniard. But despite his shortcomings, he is a positionally disciplined striker who is good on the ball, two things which certainly will help.
But his best quality is his aerial ability, and that’s probably the attribute Llorente will find himself using most for Spurs.
After last season’s wonderful second place, Pochettino’s side were clearly missing one thing, a plan B. Right from the start of the summer, two names were mentioned as signings to remedy this: Wilfried Zaha and Ross Barkley, neither of whom arrived at Spurs before the transfer deadline.
They were touted because of their ability to run at defences, an attribute Spurs don’t really have in their side, and one of the reasons they often find it hard to break down stubborn defences. But there’s more than one way to solve the problem, and with the crossing ability of the likes of Kieran Trippier and Christian Eriksen, as well as the Dane’s excellent dead ball delivery, Spurs will have a real threat from a very different route this season. The former Sevilla and Juventus striker will also give the side some much-needed Champions League experience, too. As will Aurier.
With the Premier League looking so tight this season, perhaps the small margins – the clever signings – could be what separates success from failure. And the most intelligent signings are usually the ones that give clubs a different option somewhere in their team. By signing Fernando Llorente alone, Spurs may well have turned their transfer window from a frustrating one into a very clever one.