braineclipse
Steve Sedgley
I think Dubai is on the money. Those that find the idea that Ekotto is a play-making left back seem to be of the opinion that there can be no such thing. So on that question it's more a question of terminology rather than ability.
I think Ekotto is ahead of all of our other defenders in those areas, and quite far ahead of most of them and also ahead of both Sandro and Parker. For me he isn't just in alignment he is ahead of the curve and and one of the important reasons why we can play the way we do, not just in alignment with how we play.
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http://www.whoscored.com/Teams/30/Show/England-Tottenham From the passing stat.
No surprise Luka Modric has the highest passes per game with 67.8, but Ekotto and Parker follow quite closely with 60.2 and 59.4 then there is a pretty clear drop off to 47-46 for VdV, Walker and Kaboul.
Number of passes on it's own doesn't tell much of a story. One of the things I like about Ekotto is that he rarely makes passes for the sake of passes or keeps possession for the sake of possession. He normally looks up, looks for space and tries to make passes into dangerous areas. This makes him more important to our buildup play than Parker in my opinion and, as long as Huddlestone is injured at least, it makes him the second most important player to our buildup play after Modric.
Based on this I don't think the label of play-making left back is all that strange, assuming of course that there is such a thing as a play-making left back and accepting that by the virtue of his position a play-making left back won't be racking up tons of assists or pop up around "the D" all that often. Although it's worth mentioning that only Bale and Ade have more assists than him this season.
I think Ekotto is ahead of all of our other defenders in those areas, and quite far ahead of most of them and also ahead of both Sandro and Parker. For me he isn't just in alignment he is ahead of the curve and and one of the important reasons why we can play the way we do, not just in alignment with how we play.
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http://www.whoscored.com/Teams/30/Show/England-Tottenham From the passing stat.
No surprise Luka Modric has the highest passes per game with 67.8, but Ekotto and Parker follow quite closely with 60.2 and 59.4 then there is a pretty clear drop off to 47-46 for VdV, Walker and Kaboul.
Number of passes on it's own doesn't tell much of a story. One of the things I like about Ekotto is that he rarely makes passes for the sake of passes or keeps possession for the sake of possession. He normally looks up, looks for space and tries to make passes into dangerous areas. This makes him more important to our buildup play than Parker in my opinion and, as long as Huddlestone is injured at least, it makes him the second most important player to our buildup play after Modric.
Based on this I don't think the label of play-making left back is all that strange, assuming of course that there is such a thing as a play-making left back and accepting that by the virtue of his position a play-making left back won't be racking up tons of assists or pop up around "the D" all that often. Although it's worth mentioning that only Bale and Ade have more assists than him this season.
