Spurs fans wrong to reject Barkley


TRANSFER TALK

Spurs fans wrong to reject Barkley

There is plenty of transfer talk surrounding Everton midfielder Ross Barkley and it all seems to be about Spurs, the latest being the Daily Mirror suggesting Ronald Koeman is considering a swap deal with Moussa Sissoko. This no doubt has come from the imagination of the reporter as there is nothing in the story at all to back it up.

You then wander over to a forum to see what they make of it and the general consensus of opinion seems to be that Barkley isn't good enough and isn't wanted by fans at Spurs. I think they are all missing a rather important point.

Ross Barkley is a decent footballer who is out of favour perhaps. Mauricio Pochettino would look at him and ask himself whether he would fit at Tottenham. Fans seem to think he wouldn't, I think he probably would. More than that though, Pochettino would look at the player and ask, can I improve him.

The answer to that is a resounding yes. Barkley is only 23 (24 next December). He is of the right age for us and has bags of experience in the Premier League. In my view, and I wrote at the time, he should have left Everton when he had the chance and not signed a new contract, He, for me, was always going to stagnate at Everton, they simply can't buy enough of the quality of player he needs to be playing with.

One huge advantage Pochettino has is that he improves individual players, so we shouldn't just be looking at Ross Barkley now, we should also be asking can we improve him, what can he produce if we can improve him? He is out of form at the moment, he should be totally judged on what he is doing now as the forum dwellers are doing.

I think we could turn him into the top player everyone believed he would become and even if Sissoko is improving, I would take a swap deal every time.



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