Tottenham Hotspur badly miss midfielder’s goals
By Gary Pearson
Tottenham have endured the sour taste of defeat just once in nine matches when Son Heung-min scores, highlighting the importance of his goals to overall team success.
While Sonny has contributed with some helpers in recent weeks, it’s clear that Spurs need their second leading scorer to consistently bulge the old onion bag. His goals have an immeasurable galvanizing effect on the entire squad, a fact the results irrefutably demonstrate.
Half of Tottenham’s fourteen wins have come when Sonny gets on the scoresheet, an astoundingly high percentage when you consider that the South Korean has only scored in nine matches.
Son is hopefully coming to the end of an eight-match scoring drought. His last goal came in Tottenham’s 2-0 win over West Brom over two months ago. The out-of-form South Korean has bagged just one goal in 15 matches. He missed a couple of weeks due to a hamstring strain, with most people attributing his recent scoring drought to wear and tear and cumulative fatigue.
Though Son is one of the fittest players in the side, the aggressive workload has clearly had a debilitating effect on his overall play. And when goals dry up, so too does confidence in front of goal. Son has missed some glorious chances in recent weeks to end his scoring drought, but, in rather un-Sonny fashion, wasn’t clinical enough.
Blame it on whatever you like. Finding the solution is Tottenham’s main concern. Son’s goals are an integral part of the team’s overall success. You have to go back to mid-December to source Spurs’ lone loss when Sonny scores at least one goal. That defeat came at Anfield to Liverpool, a match that Spurs played good enough to collect all three points.
Sonny, even after scoring a single goal during the current snakebitten 15-match streak, is still second in team scoring with 13 goals, eight ahead of Gareth Bale, who sits third on the team goalscoring chart.
With a 78 percent win rate when Son scores, Tottenham need to find a way to get their influential marksman regularly back on the scoresheet. While few people expect him to be as prolific as he was to start the campaign, it’s imperative for the 28-year-old to find a way to end his current drought.
His team’s overall success desperately depends on it.