Tottenham Hotspur trio Harry Winks, Serge Aurier and Pierre Emile Hojbjerg have been slammed for not showing for the ball during the League Cup Final by Sky Sports pundit Jamie Carragher on Monday Night Football.
Tottenham were beaten 1-0 by Manchester City on Sunday at Wembley, but the scoreline didn’t tell the whole story.
Spurs were thoroughly outplayed by City and managed just one shot on target during the contest.
A big issue for Tottenham was their inability to play the ball progressively up the field.
Too often Spurs were forced into a long punt up to Harry Kane, which just conceded possession cheaply.
And Carragher felt that a key reason for that was because Winks, Hojbjerg and Aurier were never actually making options for their teammates.
“It comes to Alderweireld and normally you would expect the ball to go here [to the right-back], but does Aurier look like he wants the ball at all,” he said.
“He’s not even looking at the man who has received the ball!
“Hojbjerg is behind a man, it’s easy to stand behind men and pretend that you want the ball.
“And let’s not forget that the midfield the manager picked was to play through Manchester City, that’s why Lo Celso and Winks played.
“I felt sorry for the centre-backs, again the two midfield players [Winks and Hojbjerg]. Do they really want the ball? He’s not kidding me, they’re not fooling me.”
Winks and Aurier have both come in for criticism repeatedly this season, so for them to be exposed at Wembley is, perhaps, little surprise.
Hojbjerg, though, was one of Tottenham’s best performers under Jose Mourinho, but he looked lost in a slightly wider midfield role.
Hojbjerg has generally taken responsibility for Spurs and been a real battler in their midfield.
But he did not get on the ball much on Sunday, and when he did his passing was often wasteful.
Hojbjerg wasted a real opportunity to Tottenham on the counter attack, when he overhit a pass to an overlapping Sergio Reguilon in the box.
And he may well have a point to prove under a more attacking minded boss, now that Mourinho has departed.
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