Tottenham 2017-18 Player Preview: Hugo Lloris
By Ryan Wrenn
HotspurHQ’s preseason player-by-player preview continues today with Tottenham and France captain Hugo Lloris.
This will be Lloris’ sixth season with Tottenham, making him the longest serving member of the current squad along with Jan Vertonghen.
What makes his career so remarkable is just how much he thrives in virtually all the roles asked of him.
He first arrived at a club undergoing a dramatic revamp. Harry Redknapp had just left the club, with André Villas-Boas arriving in his wake. Suddenly the need for a classic shot-stopper who rarely ventured from his own line evaporated — even if that keeper was as good as Brad Friedal.
What Villas-Boas required was a more mobile presence in goal that could come up to supplement an especially high line — but also stop those shots that near-suicidal system inevitably conceded.
That’s a huge ask, but Lloris was up to the task. He made the Spurs 18 yard box his own and threw in a heaping amount of athleticism to make a case very early on for being one of the best in England.
Not everything was within his control however. Mauricio Pochettino’s first season with Spurs was marred by an epically porous midfield and defense, one that committed more individual errors that led to a goal than any other team in the Premier League. Even Lloris couldn’t plug that many holes, though he did mitigate the damage enough to keep Spurs competitive all the same.
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Pochettino quickly went about changing the way his side defended the following summer. That meant bringing in the likes of Toby Alderweireld and, crucially, shifting Eric Dier to an essentially vacant defensive midfielder role. Such upgrades are arguably the achievement of Pochettino’s reign so far.
They also meant that Lloris was in danger of becoming almost irrelevant, at least under conventional standards for a goalkeeper. Spurs simply stopped conceding shots. No longer could Lloris count on being included in weekly highlight reels for some dexterous finger-tip save.
His value as a sweeper only grew however. With Spurs defense stabilized and competent, they could finally safely realize Villas-Boas’ dream of an improbable high line.
While Alderweireld and Vertonghen do their level best to make sure they keep things tight, they can only do so due to the confidence instilled in them by Lloris’ presence at their backs. They know that if somehow a ball or player does slip through, Lloris will charge out from his box to smother the threat.
He is invaluable on the ball as well as he is often the first movement of Spurs’ clockwork build-from-the back tactics. There is something left to be desired from his middle game — he still occasionally punts the ball aimlessly to the half-way line when under pressure, often conceding possession in the process — but overall Lloris remains one of the most complete modern goalkeepers.
Lloris’ influence isn’t confined to the pitch however. At 30-years-old, he’s the oldest man in lilywhite in Pochettino’s youthful starting XI, and as such featured in a leadership role long before he earned the captainship.
Next: Tottenham Player Preview: Ben Davies
Which means that, when Lloris signed a contract extension last summer, it only made sense that much of the team would do the same over the subsequent months. His commitment to Tottenham — especially when he could have easily moved to a bigger, more trophied club long ago — is inspiring, and it looks like it will stay that way for years to come.