This article is part of Football FanCast’s In Numbers series, which takes a statistical look at performances, season-long form and reported transfer targets…
Tottenham Hotspur midfielder Eric Dier has found first-team minutes hard to come by under Mauricio Pochettino this season, with his first Premier League start of the season not coming until the clash against Brighton and Hove Albion prior to the international break.
Following the disappointing 3-0 defeat at the Amex, a report emerged in The Times that the England international tops the list of players his Argentine manager is looking to move on during the January transfer window, as he looks to shake up his squad.
Judging by that, the 47-year-old wants the versatile player – who can feature in midfield or defence – gone in the New Year, but he certainly made an impressive cameo from the substitutes’ bench against Red Star Belgrade on Tuesday night.
Watch Tottenham Hotspur Live Streams With StreamFootball.tv Below
The north London outfit ran out comfortable 5-0 winners against the Serbian outfit at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, with the former Sporting Lisbon man on the pitch for the final 23 minutes – coming on and getting up to speed can be difficult in games like that.
However, impressively all of his 26 passes were accurate, while he also had a shot at goal too, according to WhoScored.
Perhaps what was most impressive was the range of passing he showed, with one particularly impressive long ball forward finding a teammate, which is exactly the type of quality Spurs require from those central positions.
Given the 25-year-old now faces competition from the likes of Tanguy Ndombele, Harry Winks and Moussa Sissoko for a spot in Pochettino’s central midfield, he certainly has an uphill task ahead of him.
However, unlike those three he can act as an out-and-out defensive midfielder who can sit and protect the backline, and perhaps that is what they need having conceded seven times at home to Bayern Munich with the aforementioned trio playing instead of him, for example.
Pochettino may want to axe him, but Dier showed there could still be life in him at Tottenham yet with his impressive display against Red Star.