Jose Mourinho has said to Football London that Tottenham Hotspur’s Dele Alli should look towards Ben Davies as an example over what he needs to do to break back into his plans.
Alli has fallen completely out of favour at Spurs of late, and has struggled to make their match-day squads, let alone their starting line-up.
Alli was not even in Tottenham’s 18-man squad for their most recent game against Chelsea.
And when asked what Alli needed to do to get back into the team, Mourinho pointed towards Davies’s display against Chelsea as an example.
“The ones who aren’t playing much time in their mind have only one thing to do and that is to show in the minutes they have that they should be playing,” Mourinho said.
“I don’t have any problem with Dele. I don’t have any problems with any of them. My players are happy when they play and not happy when they don’t play. I don’t blame my players. It’s only to improve their situation by using every minute they have to improve their position.
“The concept above everything is the concept that the team is more important than any of us. The example is Ben Davies. Against Chelsea he played five minutes and last season he’d play 90 minutes. But he played those 90 minutes like they were the last five minutes of his career.”
Davies has turned into a hugely reliable player for Tottenham under Mourinho.
The Welshman has been an option at left-back and in central defence, and he has rarely let Spurs down.
Although Davies does have his limitations he seems to be a player who Mourinho really trusts to play in multiple different roles, after numerous solid performances during his time in charge.
Both Davies and Alli could be in action for Tottenham tonight, when Mourinho’s side take on LASK in the Europa League.
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