Ange Postecoglou explains why 23-year-old Tottenham star has 'suffered' from game time this season

Tottenham manager Ange Postecoglou says they’ve been working with Oliver Skipp who has suffered from not playing many games this season. The 23-year-old midfielder is likely to come in for Emerson Royal who has played as a makeshift left-back due to injury Destiny Udogie and Ben Davies. 

The way Postecoglou plays, left-backs are expected to come into midfield and add to numbers as they look to outnumber the opposition and create an overlap. That has led to increased possession and the team being caught out by the added numbers in midfield. 

But the injuries and Royal’s inability to execute it properly has led to a possible addition with Skipp who Postecoglou admits he should have played more this season.

He told reporters ahead of this weekend's game: “We have been working with Skippy the last few weeks. When we lost Destiny and Ben, left with Emerson who is not really a left-back, we were looking around at options and in training we have been using him in that space. I thought he did well when he came on. 

“The way we play with full-backs, certainly with some of the positioning, he wouldn’t be too unfamiliar with the positions he would need to take up. He is an option for us and I think we need another option because we have three games this week and we only have Emerson as a back-up full-back at the club.

“Yeah, I don’t see any reason why not. He probably feels like he could have played more this year. With the way the season has gone for us in terms of our games programme, he has probably been one of the ones who has suffered because we haven’t been able to get the game time rotations we need through the year. But yeah, I see Skippy as part of our future.” 

Tottenham have lost their last four games and are in danger of slipping down the league table if they fail to get all three points with both seventh-placed Chelsea and sixth-placed Newcastle hitting form.