Ange Postecoglou has clarified why he left out James Maddison in the Tottenham midfield game against Chelsea: he believed his team needed more legs in the middle of the park.
After coming back from his injury layoff, Maddison has found it difficult to regain the form he displayed in the beginning of the season.
Given that Tottenham depends on the attacking midfielder to supply creativity, one could argue that the Lilywhites’ recent offensive woes stem from his poor play.
The Athletic first reported this week that there is a perception at Spurs that Maddison is almost trying too hard to impress, with some believing the former Leicester player is eager to make a big impression in order to guarantee his place in the England squad for the Euros.
Postecoglou benched James Maddison; why?
At Stamford Bridge, Postecoglou chose to start Dejan Kulusevski in the number ten position and bench the England international, but the decision did not have the expected outcome.
Although Maddison replaced Pape Matar Sarr after 63 minutes, the home team won 2-0 without much of an impact from him.
Postecoglou told Football.London, in response to a question about why he benched the 27-year-old, that “I thought we needed to freshen up the team.” They have a very quick and mobile front three or four, so I felt like we needed some legs today.
We simply needed more legs in the midfield, in my opinion. I believed it would benefit us since Biss, Pape, and Deki would be joining us. To be fair, though, it didn’t work.
Spurs Online Views
Since Maddison has been playing poorly lately, it is hard to argue against the decision to bench the attacking midfielder, but sometimes it seems like Ange is moving too slowly to implement the changes.
Personally, I thought he could have triggered Lo Celso far earlier. The Argentine, in my opinion, deserves a chance to play in the starting lineup to prove his abilities.
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