‘He won’t change games’ – Ex-Spurs Scout: Five things I learned from Tottenham win against Burnley
Tottenham News is delighted to welcome aboard our brilliant new columnist Bryan King, the former goalkeeper who spent six years as a senior scout at Spurs and 28 years in total in first-team scouting roles. Bryan also spent eight years on Everton’s recruitment team and 11 years scouting at Aston Villa across two different spells.
Tottenham advanced to the fourth round of the FA Cup with a 1-0 win over Burnley at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Friday 5 January.
Ange Postecoglou named a full-strength team as Spurs look to end a trophy drought which has stretched almost 16 years in north London.
Pedro Porro’s stunning goal in the 78th minute helped the club take one step closer to that objective, with the fine strike a rare moment of quality in what was an otherwise uneventful encounter.
Despite the victory, the night once again ended on a negative note for Spurs as they were handed yet another fresh injury doubt after the match when Postecoglou revealed that Ben Davies appeared to have injured his hamstring (Alasdair Gold, 5 January).
Ex-Spurs scout Bryan King was watching on for Tottenham News and has detailed five things he learned from the victory.
Attacking quality was poor
Tottenham didn’t look as impressive as they have done recently, especially going forward. Brennan Johnson had a lot of chances but he couldn’t seem to finish or produce enough power in his shots. Richarlison had chances too, but he was snatching at them and he didn’t look like much of a threat as a centre forward.
In the end, Tottenham made enough chances for themselves, they just couldn’t finish the game and it took 78 minutes for a goal. The Burnley goalkeeper did make a few good saves, but the finishing was poor. I thought all along that one goal was going to win the game, and what a goal it was to win it.
Return of Ryan Sessegnon encouraging
I have always liked Sessegnon, I liked him when he was at Fulham. He has been plagued by injury sadly, meaning we haven’t been able to see much of him, so it was pleasing to see him come on. When I worked at Everton and Aston Villa he was one of the players we looked at, but of course, he went to Tottenham.
Sessegnon looked like he was going to be the next big thing when he burst onto the scene, but when you get injured all the time it makes it difficult. He still has time, he is only 23 and he has been a first-team player since he was 16. If he can keep fit, then he is a great addition to the squad.
Lack of depth hurting Tottenham
Spurs need to get their best players back, and the sooner that happens the happier the supporters will be I imagine. I am not convinced by Oliver Skipp at all, he works hard but he produces very little. He is a decent player but he won’t change games for Tottenham, he hasn’t got that top Premier League quality for me.
It is great that Micky van de Ven was on the bench, but he shouldn’t be rushed back because these injuries can be reoccurring.
Young talent on display
I quite liked that Postecoglou introduced Jamie Donley and Dane Scarlett at the end of the match. Scarlett looked bright and full of energy, and Donley also looked bright, but I didn’t expect anything else from two young players coming on with ten minutes to go.
You want to see enthusiasm and energy and we certainly saw that from both of them.
Real chance to win the FA Cup
This is a competition which Tottenham have got a good chance of winning because looking at all the other top teams, although they should be playing their full-strength sides, they are still in Europe and have plenty of pressure on them, so whether or not they field their full-strength sides in the FA Cup remains to be seen.
I am glad Spurs got through, they have had one or two hiccups in the past, so it is good for them to be in the fourth-round draw.
In other Tottenham news, the club’s hopes of signing a young talent at Ajax have hit a roadblock.