Cutting one's nose off to spite one's face seems to be a common practice among the cohort of younger managers currently circulating within the game.
Roberto De Zerbi is one of those managers, and his actions are costing his team. We can discuss how good a manager De Zerbi is all day, and how good he is at Tottenham is still very much up for debate amid a poor start to the season on the back of a club-record transfer window.
But what we do know about De Zerbis is that he is not the friendliest boss to work for. It's his way or the highway, and there is a list of former players who will attest to that. If he doesn't like you as a player or an individual, you are likely to find yourself cut from the team by any means necessary.
It has become a trend in modern football. Younger managers appear to feel threatened by a player who is not playing ball in one way or the other, and the resolution is always to cast them aside, to have them train alone rather than dealing with the issue properly.
Rather than treating the player like an employee or, God forbid, a human being and try to resolve the differences properly, the cord is too often cut. There are always meetings, but you will find that those meetings involve the head coach demanding an apology or an agreement on his terms, and when he doesn't get one, it's plan B. It's very rarely a meeting that puts compromise on the table.
In De Zerbi's case, or at least the latest case, Richarlison has found himself in the crosshairs. The Spurs boss explained the situation by saying: “Richarlison, he said too many times that he wanted to leave.”
Now, that's not a particularly uncommon situation in football, and more experienced managers find a way to get players to put themselves in the shop window for an exit, and the club benefits from that form.
Instead, De Zerbi has removed Richarlison as an option by exiling him from his squad, and the result is that Spurs now have only two options at the top end of the pitch.
That includes Dominic Solanke, who has rarely shown promise since his big-money move from AFC Bournemouth, and Omar Marmoush has looked particularly poor since arriving on loan from Manchester City in the summer.
Top clubs typically either have two reliable options or three less reliable options to have sufficient competition for the striker role, but Spurs now have neither, and they have a capable player in Richarlison exiled from their squad.
The Brazilian certainly hasn't always been consistent Spurs, so this isn't to suggest he would suddenly become the starting frontman, but he is hard-working and has history of producing good Premier League performances, so his presence would certainly help the situation.
But never mind that, De Zerbi gets to sit on his perch and say he has the almighty power.
Younger managers must drop this sense of insecurity of they are to master proper squad management, and while they do not, they are often going to cost their team points.
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