‘A blip’: Former manager accepts that Tottenham star is struggling

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Jose Mourinho’s Tottenham Hotspur have endured a miserable few weeks in the Premier and Champions League – Dele Alli’s form hasn’t helped either.

Tottenham Hotspur star Deli Alli is in the midst of a ‘blip’ according to Karl Robinson, with his former MK Dons manager backing an England international to get back to his brilliant best when speaking to talkSPORT (11 March 2:00pm).

It seems a long time ago now that Alli was ripping West Ham United to shreds in Jose Mourinho’s first game in charge of he North London giants.

That Man of the Match display at the London Stadium has proved to be something of a false dawn, with the 23-year-old suffering another alarming dip in form in recent weeks.

Alli has scored once from open play in Tottenham’s last 17 matches and looked a shadow of his former self again as last season’s Champions League finalists suffered a humiliating 3-0 last-16 defeat to RB Leipzig on Tuesday night.

But Robinson, the man who gave a teenage Alli his big break prior to that £5 million move to Tottenham five years ago, believes Alli still has a gleaming future at the top level of the game.

“When you watch him from afar, he just seems to play like anyone you would watching playing in the park. He’s free, he’s got tremendous energy and passion for the game,” a man who is now looking to take Oxford United into the Championship told Hawksbee and Jacobs (11 March, 2:00pm).

“Footballers have years that they want to forget. This might be something of a small blip in what will be a fantastic career for the young man.”

In defence of a much-maligned talent, Alli has been forced to ply his trade in an unfamiliar centre-forward role of late with Harry Kane stuck on the sidelines with injury.

A natural-born goal-scoring midfielder, Alli is at his barnstorming best when running in behind a genuine number nine and finding pockets of space to wreak havoc in the final third. Once Kane returns, expect this Euro 2020 to rediscover his golden touch.