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Deleted member 27995
Fair assessment, a lot fairer than some of the views on him.Even when Dele was playing at his best for us there were some who still didn’t rate him because of his weaknesses ( lack of pace, holding on to the ball too long, detrimental to our build up play etc).
“If he doesn’t assist or score, what does he bring” I always found such a bizarre comment when he was scoring and assisting on a regular basis, but some folk just value skills you can put together on a video clip over boring match winning contributions.
Of course there is merit in the criticisms of his overall game and even as a Dele fan I can’t argue that he’s gone backwards and even his goal scoring touch and finishing seem to have deserted him so it’s only fair he lost his place in the team.
Goals and assists win football matches though ( one of the reasons Utd are doing so well despite having an unbalanced squad).
I just think Jose has made his point now and Dele should at least get the opportunity in the PL for more than 5 minutes. Singling him out for the flick at Stoke for instance seems harsh, especially when I watched Ndombele yesterday constantly try and dribble through 3 players marking him tightly and more often than not lose the ball.
I was someone who appreciated the goals and was happy to argue that those goals win matches, but as you point out, the lack of all round game is then applied in the guise in some circles as 'carrying him' as goals was all he had.
I have no idea if him leaving would be good for Spurs, a loan might do him good - permanently, not sure.