Will Mousa Dembélé Lose His Starting Spot at Tottenham?

With news that Mousa Dembélé’s injury could extend his time away from the pitch, is it time to start questioning his role at Tottenham?

His recent injury issues and the four matches spent suspended means that Dembélé has only played a total of about 120 minutes of football for Tottenham so far this season.

Were you to lack any other facts about Tottenham’s season so far, this would appear to be a disaster. Dembélé was just about the most important member of Tottenham’s starting XI last season besides Harry Kane. He embodies Mauricio Pochettino’s high pressing philosophy, and exudes such immense calm and competence that Tottenham rarely struggled with him on the pitch.

No where is Dembélé’s importance more easily seen than in Tottenham’s record last season. Dembélé either wasn’t available or didn’t start five of Tottenham’s six total losses in the Premier League last season. He was the biggest and most central cog into a machine that finished third in the table.

So why haven’t Tottenham’s fortunes fallen away in Dembélé’s absence?

It begins with his suspension for attempting to gouge Diego Costa’s eye in last season’s fabled Battle of Stamford Bridge. That six game forced absence compelled Pochettino to find a way to survive without the Belgian in the first four matches of the campaign.

To do so he leaned heavily on new signing Victor Wanyama. The Kenyan was not exactly in the same mold as Dembélé — he is closer to Eric Dier in terms of ability and influence– but he slotted into the former’s role with relative ease.

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As an added bonus, his presence alongside Dier only doubled down on the solidity of Tottenham’s defending. With that pair shielding the backline, it’s little wonder why Spurs have yet to concede a goal in open play and have only given up three otherwise — the lowest in the league.

We’ve talked at length before here on HotspurHQ about the trade off in fielding a player like Wanyama in Dembélé’s position. What it adds to defense it appears to take away in offense. Wanyama’s forays forward into attack were less frequent than Dembélé’s, and no one could quite match the latter’s dribbling ability anyhow.

Consequently, Tottenham’s once formidable attack appeared to take a hit. But for the phenomenal efforts of Heung-min Son, Tottenham might be looking at a lot more dour low-scoring draws instead of wins.

Part of that, of course, is down to Kane and Alli being either injured or out of form relative to last season as well as Vincent Janssen still settling in. Perhaps when those players find a foothold Wanyama’s lack of forward momentum doesn’t matter as much.

Pochettino knew he couldn’t afford to be that patient however. In recent weeks he’s gone about changing the geometry of the team as a whole and the specific roles of individual players.

Christian Eriksen has been the member of the squad most affected by these edits. He’s struggled in attacking midfield, especially against opponents who deny him the space he needs to distribute. To address both that and a lack of creativity coming from central midfield, Pochettino pushed the Dane back far enough to essentially change Tottenham’s layout from a 4-2-3-1 to a 4-1-2-3 or a 4-1-2-2-1.

That shift’s opened up possibilities for Tottenham in ways that Dembélé could never hope to duplicate. With the Belgian in the squad Tottenham had a reliable means of getting the ball up field — specifically at his feet. With Eriksen in midfield, the means of delivery is perhaps slightly less reliable but the range and variation increases dramatically.

Consider Son’s place and current fine form. He’s a player that relies on space to run into, and no way is that space better created than a clever cross field pass or devastating through ball. Dembélé’s vision and distribution would not allow such play. Eriksen, however, is a natural playmaker. He is capable of such lethal passes and, in his limited time in this new more central role, started to suggest how devastating they can be.

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The trade off, of course, is that Eriksen is farther from goal, and therefore less likely to score himself. Especially with Kane out of the side, that’s a pretty dramatic downside. With the England striker on his way to recovery, however, it could be that he and Son team up with Alli to create and score all the goals Tottenham needs to thrive.

This Saturday’s match against West Brom and next week’s trip to Leverkusen will be big tests of this new system. If Eriksen’s presence nearer to Wanyama and/or Dier proves effective against both a tightly packed defense like West Brom’s or a hard-pressing midfield like Leverkusen’s, then Dembélé’s role could be in serious jeopardy.