Speaking on Vibe with Five, Patrice Evra and Rio Ferdinand have been choosing their Team of the Tournaments from the World Cup, and Ferdinand made quite a controversial pick.
Indeed, the pundit was struggling to pick a left-back, and he ultimately settled on Tottenham Hotspur’s Ivan Perisic – despite the fact he played on the wing during the tournament.
Perisic is, of course, more than capable of playing at left-back, but Evra wasn’t accepting Ferdinand’s pick here, correctly stating that he wasn’t utilised in that spot during the tournament.
Perisic can’t be left-back
Evra argued the case against Perisic to Ferdinand.
“Left-back, I think I went for Perisic from Croatia,” Ferdinand said.
“What? He’s not even a left-back, what are you talking about Rio? I know he can play there, but you can’t say that he’s in front of Theo Hernandez for France and in front of Acuna,” Evra said.
Not how it works
We completely agree with Evra here, you can’t just put players wherever you want in these teams.
Perisic is capable of playing at left-back, but when you’re judging performances from a tournament where he played on the wing, you can’t just stick him in defence to suit your team.
The reality is that either Theo Hernandez or Argentina’s Acuna were the best left-backs at this tournament, which is quite underwhelming when you consider that neither player was a standout performer in their team.
Does Perisic deserve a place in this team? Potentially, but should he be picked at left-back? Absolutely not.
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