Spurs committed bigger mistake than failure to add a striker

Football FanCast

By Lewis Blain

Published Feb 21, 2020

Spurs' decision to loan out Kyle Walker-Peters may have been a bigger mistake than their failure to clinch a new striker during the January transfer window.

Tottenham Hotspur suffered their first defeat in eight games on Wednesday night as their hopes of advancing in the Champions League took an almighty dent.

They were beaten 1-0 by RB Leipzig in north London, meaning they head to Germany for the return leg with everything to do considering the visitors snagged an away goal.

Earlier in the week, Spurs' striker nightmare took a turn for the worse after Heung-min Son picked up an elbow injury that has ruled him out for the foreseeable future, adding to the woe of seeing top goalscorer Harry Kane on the sidelines.

Failure to add a new frontman during the January transfer window is now looking like one monumental mistake from chairman Daniel Levy.

However, there may be bigger issues after a disasterclass at the opposite end of the pitch...

Serge Aurier's struggles defensively continued as Leipzig's match-winner Timo Werner ran rings around him all evening.

Per SofaScore, the 27-year-old lost possession 24 times - more than any other player on the pitch - while he also managed a dire 65% passing accuracy and just 40% of his crosses found a Spurs player.

The Ivory Coast international also committed one foul and was dribbled past on two occasions. It really was a horrific night for Aurier.

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This has to come as a massive concern as he's the only senior right-back option at the club now after Levy sanctioned Kyle Walker-Peters' loan move to league rivals Southampton last month.

A decision that is already appearing to come back to haunt the north London side.

At least without a striker, Jose Mourinho can call on the attacking talents of Lucas Moura, Steven Bergwijn, Erik Lamela and so on.

But at right-back, it's either Aurier or a centre-back horribly exposed out wide such as Toby Alderweireld or Japhet Tanganga.

This season across the UCL and the Premier League, the right-back is averaging 1.3 fouls, 1.5 unsuccessful touches and just 0.8 crosses per game, via WhoScored, which simply isn't good enough.