Darren Bent has hammered Tanguy Ndombele for his performances in a Tottenham Hotspur shirt, as reported by Football Insider.
What did he say?
The Frenchman has come under fire in recent times, with the likes of Jose Mourinho and Jamie Carragher particularly damning in their criticism. The current Spurs boss lambasted Ndombele for not giving the team enough, whilst the latter simply labelled the midfielder’s performance against Burnley a “disgrace”.
And now, former Spurs striker Bent has also not held back on the Frenchman, as he said: “I think he needs time to settle, but I have questioned what exactly is going on at Spurs, and what is going on with him? He doesn’t seem to be able to play back-to-back 90 minutes, and he doesn’t seem to last 90 minutes either. Is it an issue with his fitness, or is he not quite ready to play yet?
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“Either way, for the amount of money they paid for him, you’ve got to be ready to go off the bat, straight away. He’s not. There’s clearly an underlying issue there, and I think that’s what Mourinho is alluding to by saying ‘we need him to up his levels’.
“When you pay that kind of fee for somebody, I was really, really excited to see what he can do. But for whatever reason, it’s just not worked out for him yet.”
Underwhelming
The 23-year-old has certainly been underwhelming since arriving from Lyon, as indicated by the fact that he has only completed the full 90 minutes in a game five times – the last of those was in December, during a 2-2 draw against bottom of the table Norwich City.
When looking at his in-game statistics in the Premier League, Ndombele doesn’t actually seem too bad: he averages 1.2 tackles, 0.7 interceptions, 0.6 key passes and two dribbles per game, while also maintaining a pass success rate of 85.6%.
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However, when actually watching him on the pitch, he looks pretty clearly off the pace and has struggled to truly make his mark on games – he has managed just two goals and four assists in 27 games.
It seems as though there is difficulty in pinpointing what exactly is going wrong for Ndombele, but it is clear that improvement needs to be made judging by the numerous negative responses to his displays.
Meanwhile, Spurs fans loved Mourinho’s decision on one Spurs man.