Tottenham Hotspur journalist Alasdair Gold has shared his reaction to Oliver Skipp’s performance for the Lilywhites in their recent 2-0 win over West Ham United in the Premier League.
Goals from Emerson Royal and Son Heung-min secured the three points for Spurs on Sunday following on from their 1-0 defeat to AC Milan in the Champions League last week.
Towards the end of the game, Gold took to Twitter to share his thoughts on Skipp’s performance in the match when he was being substituted off for Pape Matar Sarr.
He said: “Sarr replaces Skipp, who gets a standing ovation from the crowd. He’s been very good today, especially after collecting that early yellow card.”
With 89 minutes under his belt, the midfielder had 74 touches of the ball in total, successfully completing 49 of the 56 passes he attempted.
However, it was his efforts off the ball that showed the Englishman prove how useful he can be for the team.
For example, he ended up making four tackles, two clearances and one interception as well as winning eight of the 11 duels he was involved in, which is the joint-highest in the team, and not getting dribbled past on even one occasion.
Did Oliver Skipp have a good game against West Ham?
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This performance ultimately earned the 22-year-old an overall match rating of 7.3/10 from SofaScore, making him the joint-second highest rated Spurs player on the day that started the match against David Moyes’ side.
The Evening Standard also picked up on Skipp’s performance by describing him as being “combative and energetic” for his side on the pitch.
Taking all of this into account, it’s clear that the midfielder had a strong performance for Spurs against the Hammers and very much justified his praise from Gold and the applause he received from the home supporters.
Moving forward, with Rodrigo Bentancur out injured for the rest of the season, Skipp is likely to now be a prominent figure in the team, which, going off his performance against West Ham, could be a good thing for him and Spurs.