Tottenham End of Season Review: Christian Eriksen

It feels like Christian Eriksen’s accomplishments this season at Tottenham were lost beneath the accomplishments of his teammates.

Harry Kane proved he was no one-hit wonder. Mousa Dembélé found himself at the center of Mauricio Pochettino’s tactical plans. Dele Alli went from promising youngster to full-fledged star.

While all of those narratives played out, Eriksen quietly went about adjusting and improving his already formidable game.

Eriksen’s role at Tottenham shifts from season to season. In his first season with the club under André Villas-Boas, his role was that of a typical all-around attacking playmaker, similar in spirit to a David Silva or Juan Mata. To that end, he managed a decent tally of both goals and assists in an overall impressive debut Premier League season.

When Mauricio Pochettino took over in the summer of 2014, Eriksen evolved into a more direct role behind Harry Kane. The pair actually worked well together, functioning  in tandem as a thoroughly modern take on a striking pair. Kane, of course, was the more regular scorer, but often dropped deep to help build play, while Eriksen traded assists for an uptick of shots and goals. He would score ten goals — several of which were decisive, late game efforts — but only set up two goals.

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Pochettino seemed set to continue this pairing in attack onto this season, but clearly felt that it took too much away from the team to deprive it of Eriksen’s creative influence. The Dane’s role began to change. He split his time between the left side of attack and the hole behind Kane, though in either position his duties were similar: orchestrate Tottenham’s play around the opposition penalty area.

The number of passes he made that resulted in shots abruptly went up from 2.2 in 2014/15 to 3.3, per WhoScored. He was operating from deeper areas, retrieving the ball through dense opposition midfield and defensive lines and keeping Tottenham’s attack in tune. The 13 assists he accumulated by the end of the season were the second highest in the Premier League, better than both Riyah Mahrez and Dimitri Payet, and bested only be Arsenal’s Mesut Özil.

Eriksen embodied what Tottenham have missed for the past handful of seasons: a true playmaker.  Those 13 assists are the most recorded by an individual Tottenham player since Emmanuel Adebayor’s notched 11 in his stunning 2011/12 season.

He wasn’t exactly selfless — his shot count per game actually increased over 2014/15 — but his willingness and ability to drop deep and stay narrow made him much more of a creative threat.

This transformation was facilitated rather directly by the rise of Alli. The 19-year-old began the season has something of a box-to-box midfielder, shuttling the ball forward in a role that combined defense and creativity.

By the turn of the year, however, Pochettino recognized in Alli the same qualities he saw in Eriksen a season before. He could feature in the hole behind Kane and be relied upon for an extra element of directness, while also proving to be a creative force in his own right.

The end result was a preferred starting XI that featured an attacking band of midfielders including Eriksen seaming together the midfield and attack, Alli punching through it in assist of Kane and Érik Lamela doing a bit of both and more. 

Alli and Lamela had stellar seasons in their own right, but credit must go to Eriksen for being the spoon that stirred the pot. Even as critics cited his lack of production midway through the season and he yearned for a return to the center of the attack, he powered through and continued to be an influence right up to the end of the season.

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At 24 years old and with three seasons under his belt at Tottenham, Eriksen has become a legitimate veteran. In a team that seems set to only become more youthful in the seasons to come, Pochettino will continue to rely on Eriksen as much for his individual ability as his ability to fit into Tottenham’s wider system.

Final Grade: A