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This article is part of Football FanCast’s The Chalkboard series, which provides a tactical insight into teams, players, managers, potential signings and more…
Tottenham Hotspur face an in-form Crystal Palace but a currently out-of-sorts Wilfried Zaha on Saturday, but it doesn’t mean that the Ivory Coast international won’t pose a big threat to the hosts’ defence, and in turn need to be stopped.
On the chalkboard
Having scored 10 goals and provided a further 10 assists in the Premier League last season, as per Transfermarkt, it has been a slow start to the 2019/20 campaign for the Ivory Coast international following a summer of exit speculation and a transfer request – he has neither a goal nor an assist in five outings in all competitions.
The Eagles became renowned for being a huge threat on the road last term, beating the likes of Manchester City, Arsenal, Leicester and Wolves on their travels.
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Zaha scored three times and assisted once in those encounters, and his pace and proven dribbling ability mean that he will always cause worry for opposition defences.
Spurs must repeat April trick
Mauricio Pochettino decided to line up with both Ben Davies and Danny Rose on the left-hand side when the north London outfit hosted Palace at their new stadium back in April, and the experiment worked wonders as they won 2-0.
The former made one brilliant first-half challenge to stop the Ivorian, who was the second-worst rated player from the Eagles’ starting XI according to WhoScored.
Effectively doubling up on the winger worked wonders then, and there is no reason why it wouldn’t work again this weekend.
With Tottenham looking shaky at the back in recent weeks – as shown by their 1-0 home defeat to Newcastle and their collapse against Arsenal – and only having one Premier League win to their name, a more solid line-up with a defensively-minded left winger could be tempting given some of Roy Hodgson men’s impressive results away at some of the better teams in the Premier League previously.
Playing Rose and Davies would also eradicate a potential selection headache Pochettino may have on Saturday, with both left-backs pushing for a regular starting spot.
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