For reasons that might not be his fault, Tottenham Hotspur seem to be disintegrating this season. Players are falling like flies, or they’re ‘dead’- as Jose puts it. The backline is constantly exposed due to a lack of depth and that has hindered the process of finding the shape for the team. But if there’s a position that can sort all of it out, it is the defensive midfield.
That role has never been a stranger to Jose’s system. At Chelsea, he helped pioneer what is still known as the ‘Makelele role’. At Manchester United, he signed Nemanja Matic and got one very good season out of him. Both players gave Mourinho’s teams a real structure. That sort of structure is what Mourinho’s Spurs have been lacking since November and is one of the main reasons their odds for Champions League qualification have grown and grown. Sites like leading online bookie efirbet.com/en/ are showing less and less confidence in Jose’s side finishing in the top five.
Spurs seem muddled between Jose’s Tottenham and Mauricio Pochettino’s Tottenham. They don’t have one set identity. They go from three-at-the -back to four-at-the-back regularly. No matter what shape they have at the back, they still leak goals. Toby Alderweireld and Jan Vertonghen take a lot of criticism, as they get exposed time and time again.
Mourinho was initially keen on using Eric Dier as the defensive midfielder in his usual 4-2-3-1. But once he saw the Englishman’s ineptness in that position, Harry Winks was ushered in. While the England international has done a decent job and has earned Jose’s trust, Winks is not the destroyer that Mourinho has had in that position.
Tanguy NDombele has played in that role once and did well against Norwich, but he’s far from being a tackler. More importantly, he took criticism from Mourinho about not working hard enough. That might be tough-love, but when Mourinho sees someone not doing enough, he will always test them.
In many senses, Mourinho does have the Frank Lampard-esque attacking midfielder in Dele Alli. He does have an all-action Michael Essien-like player in Ndombele or Giovani Lo Celso. But not having that Matic or Makelele-like anchor-man sees the whole structure get pulled apart.
Winks gets dribbled past 1.2 times per game and completed only 1.3 tackles per game. It shows that he might not be the long-term option in that role. He has merely been a spot-gap to cover up when nothing else seems to be working. He has done an alright job but it isn’t upto the level that Mourinho demands his defensive midfielder to fundamentally be.
In the 2013-14 season with Mourinho at Chelsea, Matic won 3.3 tackles per game. He did get dribbled past 1.4 times per game but he knew where the ball would fall. He had that sense for knowing where to position himself in front of the back-four.
Someone like Victor Wanyama has done that job in the past. But the Kenyan’s injury issues over the years have seen him become a much slower player and he now finds himself at Montreal Impact. A Wanyama who was at his peak could have done exactly the sort of job that Mourinho wants in a defensive midfielder.
Mourinho knows that a rebuild is needed. He recently said in a press conference: “Obviously people are tired to listen to it but the run of injuries this club had this season, starting with Hugo Lloris and ending with Sonny, is something really crazy. But again we have to prepare ourselves for something similar to happen again and we have to build a squad that protects against this kind of situation.”
If that is the case like it should be, the defensive midfield position should be his priority. It was the case in the summer of 2017 when he signed Matic from Chelsea for United. He had signed the Serbian from Benfica at Chelsea. Another Benfica player in Florentino Luis could help him out a lot this time around.
Florentino, 20, is known to be one of the best young prospects in Portugal like Gedson is. They are known to be very good friends. This season, the defensive midfielder has played only seven games in Liga NOS but he has a tally of 8.78 recoveries per game. He makes as many as 4.55 interceptions per game.
He is the sort of player who has a big size and sits infront of the back-four. He does the dirty job and supplies the ball forward. Being Portuguese, Mourinho and Jorge Mendes will always have a say in his future. He does have a big release clause like Gedson did but things can change quickly in football.
If Jose doesn’t fix that defensive midfield issue at Spurs, his tenure can be over sooner than expected. And Spurs have to trust whatever signings he brings in. A lot of what is going on isn’t his fault. He needs the support to go through this phase.
