Hugo Lloris Is This Season’s ‘Gareth Bale’ For Tottenham

This season Tottenham goalkeeper, Hugo Lloris, is becoming as important to Spurs as Gareth Bale was last year before his summer transfer to Real Madrid.

In Tottenham’s win over Fulham at White Hart Lane, Hugo Lloris, once again, demonstrated how important a player he is to the team with a number of outstanding saves as Spurs secured their 3 – 1 victory. It is another in a number of outstanding performances this season from Tottenham’s international goalkeeper who has been described by manager Tim Sherwood as ‘world-class’.

Last season it was Gareth Bale who was the ‘star’ of the Tottenham team with a string of performances and goals which carried Spurs to 5th in the League, just missing out on the Champions League. Bale’s speciality was late goals of stunning quality and raised the question of where Tottenham would be without Gareth Bale.

Now, the same question can be asked in relation to Lloris’ contribution to the Tottenham season. Where would Spurs be without Lloris?

In the win over Fulham, Lloris made a number of exceptional saves which denied Fulham – he saved Steve Sidwell’s penalty, he made two great saves against Hugo

Rodallega, particularly the save from a bullet-like header, two minutes after Spurs had regained the lead and then two more important saves late in the game. Without Lloris’ contribution Saturday’s deserved victory could easily have been an embarrassing defeat.

Without going through every game, and carrying out a detailed forensic examination of Lloris’ contribution, I am still able to list a number of games where Lloris ensured Spurs took the three points with vital saves. To the game against Fulham, add the following to the list:

v Everton (h) Won 1 – 0 Early saves which prevented the visitors from taking control of the game
v Newcastle (a) Won 4 – 0 Again, early saves denied Newcastle and allowed Spurs to take control later in the game
v Fulham (a) Won 2 – 1 His performance ensured victory and enabled Spurs to recover to win

Even in drawn games and in defeat, Hugo Lloris has frequently been the Spurs ‘Man of the Match’ with his performance preventing further embarrassment.

Hugo Lloris [Photo: Alan Hill]Without a goalkeeper of Lloris’ ability, Spurs fans would be lamenting an even more disappointing season. The players in their comments after Saturday’s success acknowledged Lloris’ contribution. Younes Kaboul’s comments were reported on the Spurs web-site,

"Big credit to Hugo because he kept us in the game…….He is so quick and so intelligent and that’s the difference compared to some of the other goalkeepers."

Fans are also aware of the importance of Lloris to the team and their biggest worry about the summer transfer window would be that Lloris would decide that he wants to leave Tottenham for a club which can offer him Champions League football. Tottenham supporters are only too aware of this problem having lost Luka Modric and Bale in the past two seasons. They don’t want Lloris to follow the same pathway of those former players. This tweet from @SpursDreamer describes the thoughts of every Spurs fan,

Tim Sherwood commenting on Lloris after Saturday’s game praised him as World Class and one of the best keepers in the world. The question of Lloris’ future was raised a few months ago but the manager commented on Saturday, as reported on Twitter by @HotspurRelated.

"Hugo has never, ever said that we must get into Champions League or he’ll go elsewhere I don’t think. Without a doubt, no one wants him to leave. He doesn’t say a lot, just gets on with it, and when he’s needed he’s done brilliantly."

Spurs fans will want to believe that this is the case and that Lloris will remain at White Hart Lane. Spurs can’t afford to continue selling their best players but it is always a difficult time when players go off to World Cup and European competitions and spend a lengthy period with players from other clubs. It can increase their desire to move on for ‘better’ things so we’ll have to wait and hope that Lloris doesn’t become distracted and decide that he wants a move.

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