Spurs midfielder Dele Alli has been criticised for a tackle on Manchester City’s Kevin de Bruyne.
A late challenge from Alli caught De Bruyne on the ankle in Tottenham’s 4-1 defeat to the Premier League leaders last weekend, with the Spurs man escaping with only a yellow card.
However, Dier, who is Alli’s closest friend at Tottenham, has insisted that the 21-year-old is not a malicious player and that the incident at the Etihad has been blown out of proportion.
He told Sky Sports: “Dele is not a malicious player. He’s made a tackle, the referee made a decision, gave him a yellow card and that’s that really.
“You know, it’s football. The speed at which it is played there are going to be bad tackles, there are going to be good tackles and that’s football”.
Although Alli’s tackle on De Bruyne could be written off as unintentional, it was still dangerous and gave weight to the argument that sometimes the England international plays on the edge.
Alli has previously been retrospectively banned by the Football Association for bunching West Bromwich Albion’s Claudio Yacob in the gut as the title slipped away from Spurs in 2016.
The former MK Dons player also missed the first three games of Tottenham’s Champions League campaign following his dismissal for a two-footed challenge against Gent in last season’s Europa League.
While these incidents are not proof that Alli is malicious – he only has two yellow cards this season – it would be fair to say that the youngster remains hot-headed and still has some growing up to do.
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