Alasdair Gold spoke about Harry Winks’ chances of getting back into the Spurs team on the Gold and Guest talk Tottenham podcast.
It has been some fall from grace for Winks, who has featured for one minute in the Premier League under Nuno Espirito Santo, having previously started in the club’s last two cup finals, but now can only find starts in the Europa Conference League under new manager Espirito Santo.
However, he is reportedly happy to remain at Spurs, thus why he didn’t move on during the summer transfer window.
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Oliver Skipp has recently returned from a loan spell with Norwich City and taken his opportunity with both hands, starting and playing the full 90 minutes in all three Premier League games, proving that he is a first-choice midfielder at present, despite his lack of top-flight experience compared to Winks.
Winks has not featured much under Nuno, but Gold refuses to bash the midfielder, though he did reveal his fears over the 25-year-old’s first-team future.
“I’ve never been on the Harry Winks hate train. I will always point to his performances like at the Bernabeu against Real Madrid, in the Champions League against Borussia Dortmund, he was superb at Wembley against Liverpool.
“There’s a very, very good player – you don’t get Pochettino calling him the little Iniesta for nothing. He gets a lot of hate now, and I think a lot of it comes again from the lack of rhythm, the lack of confidence.
“Nuno could be the man to get that out of him. I think it would probably take an injury to either Skipp or Hojbjerg for him to get the game time for it to happen.”
TIF Thoughts on Winks…
Winks has been with Tottenham his whole career, and his desire to make it at the north London club may be what is holding his career back, as there are players ahead of him now in the pecking order to be getting regular game time at Spurs as well as the England squad.
As Gold highlighted, it is likely going to need an injury to one of Skipp or Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg for Winks to even get a look-in given Espirito Santo’s early team selections as Spurs boss, but even then, he has competition from the likes of Tanguy Ndombele and Giovani Lo Celso who can operate in a central-midfield role.
With interest in Winks being there in the past from clubs such as Valencia and Newcastle United, this January may be his time to move on if he gets to the winter window and has seen his opportunities limited to cup appearances.