Gary Neville has said to Sky Sports that Serge Aurier’s actions in the 94th minute of Tottenham Hotspur’s game against Manchester United were really stupid.
Tottenham were chasing the game in injury time, with the score at 2-1, when Aurier went careering into Luke Shaw.
The referee gave a free-kick to United, when Shaw had nowhere to go, and had just booted the ball back to Tottenham’s defenders.
It gave the Red Devils a chance to relieve all the pressure building on them and waste some more precious time.
In the end, United did more than that from it too – after the free-kick was taken, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s men moved up the field and scored a third through Mason Greenwood.
And Neville just couldn’t understand the Tottenham’s defender’s actions.
“It’s stupid from Aurier,” he said. “It just allows Manchester United to run the clock down. The ball was back with his centre-backs. He’s nowhere near it.”
Aurier has improved this season, but he still has made far too many errors.
While this tackle was hardly a huge mistake, it was another example that he can often be clumsy when asked to make big decisions, and it ultimately cost Tottenham.
Spurs did attempt to bring in Matt Doherty to replace Aurier in their starting line-up last summer, but the Irishman has also struggled this term.
And it could be that Tottenham have to enter the market for another right-back in the summer, as they seek to make their defence much tighter.
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