Tottenham Hotspur would consider selling Matt Doherty this summer if they fail to land any bids for Emerson Royal in the coming weeks.
This has been suggested by The Sun’s Martin Lipton who has been speaking about the potential departures from N17 on the Off The Ball YouTube channel.
Doherty’s time at Spurs has been full of ups and downs with the Irishman finding his form under Antonio Conte before sustaining a season-ending injury.
The 30-year-old has returned to action this pre-season, however, in their latest friendly against Rangers, Doherty was the only outfield player to be left on the bench.
And with the arrival of Djed Spence in recent days, Lipton does feel the future of Emerson and Doherty are both under scrutiny with Spurs willing to offload either:
“I thought he was he was struggling to be the player he’d been at Wolves or indeed was in an Ireland shirt. And then suddenly last season for a couple of months, he was absolutely outstanding. He’s certainly a far better attacking player than Emerson Royal.”
” I think that Doherty will certainly, if he’s fit and right, I think he would probably start the season as the first-choice right-back or right wing-back. That doesn’t mean he’ll stay there.
“And it all depends and that presupposes they’re going to sell someone which will be I suspect Emerson Royal but were they to receive a bid for Doherty and not for Royal then they might decide to cash in there. Just because they have Spence now adding to the squad.”
TIF Thoughts on Lipton’s comments…
Given Emerson has failed to impress in Conte’s system as a right wing-back, we absolutely feel Spurs should be doing all they can to offload the Brazilian this summer.
Who'd you rather Spurs sell this summer?
Matt Doherty
Emerson Royal
Doherty has had his struggles since joining Spurs, however, under Conte he has shown improved form and we think he is the more suited option of the two in providing Spurs with an attacking threat from the wing-back position.
But with Lucas Moura now seemingly an option at right wing-back, we do not think Spurs can go into the new campaign with four options in that position.