Plan for ‘phenomenal’ Skipp revealed as new role mapped out

[mawspurs]

Tottenham are mapping out a key first-team role for Oliver Skipp next season after his hugely successful Norwich City loan. The 20-year-old has made a huge impact for Daniel Farke’s promotion chasers, where he has remarkably started all 28 of their Championship matches.

Source: Football Insider

 

[davidmatzdorf]

Bloody hell, look at the size of him. Boy to man in one season.

I'm deeply unsurprised by this. The article sounds plausible and not invented. I thought Skipp looked nearly-Premiership-ready at 18. Calm, organised, good technique, not shy of a tackle, with a canny sense of space and positioning. If he's that much stronger and that much more seasoned, he could come back, learn from Højbjerg and give us at last the powerful, dominating midfield we have lacked since the days of Dembélé and Wanyama.

 

[Chedozie]

On current form, he’d walk into our team. No pun intended.

 

[Marty]

On current form, he’d walk into our team. No pun intended.

If you were going for the pun you'd have said he'd ...

skip into it.




I'll see myself out

 

[EQP]

Bloody hell, look at the size of him. Boy to man in one season.

I'm deeply unsurprised by this. The article sounds plausible and not invented. I thought Skipp looked nearly-Premiership-ready at 18. Calm, organised, good technique, not shy of a tackle, with a canny sense of space and positioning. If he's that much stronger and that much more seasoned, he could come back, learn from Højbjerg and give us at last the powerful, dominating midfield we have lacked since the days of Dembélé and Wanyama.

Very well said. Really happy that we're getting better at loaning out our brightest talents to clubs that are interested in developing said players. I've come to the conclusion that a big advantage Skipp has over Winks is that he went out on loan and proved himself. The experience of playing against grown men during your formative years in a physical league like the championship and doing well is nothing to scoff at. I do wonder if Winks never going out on loan has impacted his mentality/toughness. I posted in the Winks thread that a few of his teammates ( past & current) consider him the biggest diva/moaner at the club. He's had the comfort of the Spurs training ground since he was 10 in the academy and hasn't really seen life outside Spurs at clubs that have fractionally less in infrastructure. That can lead to complacency.

 

[mumfordspur]

If you were going for the pun you'd have said he'd ...

skip into it.




I'll see myself out

"Your coat Sir"

 

[rez9000]

"Not only is he regarded as Tottenham’s finest academy product since Harry Winks but he could also potentially replace him as a fixture in the team."

Ethel the tea lady is a finer academy product than Harry Winks.

(OK, I'm being unfair, but that last performance has left a scar on my eyes).

 

[eViL]

Bloody hell, look at the size of him. Boy to man in one season.

I'm deeply unsurprised by this. The article sounds plausible and not invented. I thought Skipp looked nearly-Premiership-ready at 18. Calm, organised, good technique, not shy of a tackle, with a canny sense of space and positioning. If he's that much stronger and that much more seasoned, he could come back, learn from Højbjerg and give us at last the powerful, dominating midfield we have lacked since the days of Dembélé and Wanyama.

He's always been pretty good at using his strength, even at 16.

But yeah, he's got some filling out to do yet. He'll be solid.

 

[DanielJohnCosta]

dominating midfield we have lacked since the days of Dembélé and Wanyama.

which one of pierre and skipp is playing the Dembele role because I see them both as CDM. Unless you mean one of them + Ndombele then i'd agree with you.

 

[Johnny J]

which one of pierre and skipp is playing the Dembele role because I see them both as CDM. Unless you mean one of them + Ndombele then i'd agree with you.

I really hope we see 3 in midfield.

 

[DanielJohnCosta]

I really hope we see 3 in midfield.

I don't think I do tbh. It's too negative. I'd rather sacrifice one of Pierre-skipp for a #10

 

[Johnny J]

I don't think I do tbh. It's too negative. I'd rather sacrifice one of Pierre-skipp for a #10

We always get outnumbered in midfield tho.

 

[davidmatzdorf]

which one of pierre and skipp is playing the Dembele role because I see them both as CDM. Unless you mean one of them + Ndombele then i'd agree with you.

I don't think you can match individuals to roles that consistently. Dembélé's ball-retention and ability to take the ball 25m up the pitch from where he received it is best reproduced by Ndombele, but in many ways Dembélé is a unique footballer, so there's no point in trying to reproduce what he offered in one body.

From the article, it sounds as if Skipp is developing box-to-box abilities (I always thought he had a bit of the Scott Parker about him). and Højbjerg can do a bit of that, too. All of them can win the ball. Skipp and Højbjerg have good positional understanding. Ndombele's passing vision is extraordinary and his accuracy and weight of vertical pass and through ball can be lethal.

And they're all tough, physically powerful units. Between the three of them, I can see us having a powerful, controlling, ball-retaining midfield again (especially when Kane drops back), but it doesn't follow that one of them is Dembélé, one is Wanyama, one is Dier, etc. And I haven't even mentioned Lo Celso, who also doesn't always take prisoners out there. We need players with physicality and skill. We've tended to have one or the other, e.g., Sissoko and WInks, both of whom are good role players, but Sissoko is never going to be a technical virtuoso and Winks' passing range was arguably better at 20 than it is now.

I don't think I do tbh. It's too negative. I'd rather sacrifice one of Pierre-skipp for a #10

Similarly, I think it's possible to look at it in a less rigid way. Ndombele takes up positions all over the pitch. He can pop in through balls like a no.10, hang onto possession like a no. 8 and win the ball like a no 6. Kane spends a significant amount of time in a no. 10 role. So does Lo Celso, when he's not in hospital.

We have had a problem with midfield ball retention for a few years now. If we have players who can do that and can also link up play and arrive in the box during attacks, I'm not sure a dedicated no. 10 is entirely relevant.

 

[Japhet]

I don't think I do tbh. It's too negative. I'd rather sacrifice one of Pierre-skipp for a #10

It's not negative when you have players like Ndombele and LoCelso who can take the ball in deep positions and either pass vertically or beat opponents with the ball at their feet. It draws the opposing midfield higher up the pitch and creates spaces in front of their back line. One of our greatest weaknesses when we had Eriksen was that our opponents knew that if they could shut Eriksen down we'd struggle to be creative. We've also seen recently that 2 in midfield frequently struggle to be competitive when they're outnumbered and also offer fewer pasiing options when we try to play out from the back, usually resulting in Eric Dier firing a 50yd 'pass' straight into the stands. That's negative.

 

[mark87]

Very well said. Really happy that we're getting better at loaning out our brightest talents to clubs that are interested in developing said players. I've come to the conclusion that a big advantage Skipp has over Winks is that he went out on loan and proved himself. The experience of playing against grown men during your formative years in a physical league like the championship and doing well is nothing to scoff at. I do wonder if Winks never going out on loan has impacted his mentality/toughness. I posted in the Winks thread that a few of his teammates ( past & current) consider him the biggest diva/moaner at the club. He's had the comfort of the Spurs training ground since he was 10 in the academy and hasn't really seen life outside Spurs at clubs that have fractionally less in infrastructure. That can lead to complacency.

While I feel a loan for younger players is definitely key for their development, with Skipp showing this, I don't think a lack of loan move when he was younger for Winks is the reason why he currently isn't producing. This would make sense if he never played well while in the first team with us, but this isn't the case for Harry, he has played some absolute blinders for us in recent seasons, the two games against Madrid in the CL prime examples of this, and he was able to achieve these great performances without a loan move beforehand.

Why Winks' performances have dropped in the last couples seasons I personally think is down to not having adequate partners in the middle of midfield in terms of ability and he has had to fill this void and being used out of position by playing deeper and therefore his strengths were not being used. This seemed to start when dembele was sold and effectively replaced by sissoko and we all know a midfield two of sissoko and winks just doesn't work.

Now I know he now has better midfield options in Hojbjerg and Tanguy, and partnering them should in theory allow him to bring the best out of him, but with his performance level drop int he last 2/3 years has seriously dented his confidence and it also has not helped not using his best attributes for quite a long time. While he ever get back to those Madrid performances? Who knows, I hope he does whether it's with us or another club because he's a top lad and deserves to have a good career.

 

[mumfordspur]

I don't think I do tbh. It's too negative. I'd rather sacrifice one of Pierre-skipp for a #10

Can't argue with that DJ
Both appear to be very good players but only limited times for them to play together

 

[Who’s our next manager?]

which one of pierre and skipp is playing the Dembele role because I see them both as CDM. Unless you mean one of them + Ndombele then i'd agree with you.

Besides Skipp and Hojbjerg we need another ‘top’ box to box player. New boy + Nkoudou with Hojbjerg + Skipp means we can sell Winks and Sissoko and use the proceeds to improve the defence. Plenty of games for all of them. If needed Lo Celso could even drop back.Wouldnt mind the new boy to be Frank Kessie.

 

[EQP]

While I feel a loan for younger players is definitely key for their development, with Skipp showing this, I don't think a lack of loan move when he was younger for Winks is the reason why he currently isn't producing. This would make sense if he never played well while in the first team with us, but this isn't the case for Harry, he has played some absolute blinders for us in recent seasons, the two games against Madrid in the CL prime examples of this, and he was able to achieve these great performances without a loan move beforehand.

Why Winks' performances have dropped in the last couples seasons I personally think is down to not having adequate partners in the middle of midfield in terms of ability and he has had to fill this void and being used out of position by playing deeper and therefore his strengths were not being used. This seemed to start when dembele was sold and effectively replaced by sissoko and we all know a midfield two of sissoko and winks just doesn't work.

Now I know he now has better midfield options in Hojbjerg and Tanguy, and partnering them should in theory allow him to bring the best out of him, but with his performance level drop int he last 2/3 years has seriously dented his confidence and it also has not helped not using his best attributes for quite a long time. While he ever get back to those Madrid performances? Who knows, I hope he does whether it's with us or another club because he's a top lad and deserves to have a good career.

But doesn't this all boil down to his ability to motivate himself, to push through difficult moments and thus his overall mentality? You highlighted that his best performances were against Real. Those were high profile games but how often does he apply himself when it's against less elite opposition? Isn't the mark of a good player defined by how often said player is able to perform regardless of opposition? I do agree that being tasked to play DM hasn't been great for Winks but that doesn't explain why he hasn't been able to do the basics of keeping the ball and passing the ball. We can blame having Sissoko as a partner but there was a good stretch during the Poch era when Winks & Sissoko were an effective pairing for us. I mean look at this compilation, he can't really blame anyone but himself.

​

Now, going out on loan is no guarantee that a player will come back hardened or mentally stronger. What it does offer, especially if the player is loaned to a club in the lower leagues, is the 1st hand experience of having to live on your own, having to convince your new teammates and coach that you can be counted on as you have no credit with those players, performing on these choppy pitches, having really bare bones away dressing rooms and coming up against really physical players. If a player experiences all that and performs in those conditions, it's usually an indication that they're at least intrinsically motivated to give their all regardless of circumstance. I truly feel Winks has also bought into his hype of those performances against Real but has failed to progress since then. I mean here below are clips of Wanyama, Lamela and even Winks admitting that he is the biggest diva/moaner at the club. He hasn't achieved anything to be moaning or complaining and if he had gone out on loan, he would had those bad habits kicked out of him.

​

 

[olliec]

But doesn't this all boil down to his ability to motivate himself, to push through difficult moments and thus his overall mentality? You highlighted that his best performances were against Real. Those were high profile games but how often does he apply himself when it's against less elite opposition? Isn't the mark of a good player defined by how often said player is able to perform regardless of opposition? I do agree that being tasked to play DM hasn't been great for Winks but that doesn't explain why he hasn't been able to do the basics of keeping the ball and passing the ball. We can blame having Sissoko as a partner but there was a good stretch during the Poch era when Winks & Sissoko were an effective pairing for us. I mean look at this compilation, he can't really blame anyone but himself.

​

Guys confidence is already completely shot so not sure what videos like this is trying to prove. I don’t agree with it and will always support a player wearing our badge.

 

[parj]

If he makes one mistake or passes sideways we will be calling for his head and asking Levy to pull out the cheque book. He needs 6 to 10 games to get settled, and I mean starting.