Capoue, Paulinho & Stambouli, Spurs to sell 1, 2 or 3?

Tottenham are still looking to strengthen the defensive midfield with Nabil Bentaleb and Ryan Mason having had to do the bulk of the work, but how many players will Pochettino change?



Paulinho has been very poor  and I have covered before why mentally he is not the right player for Spurs. We all see what we want to see to justify our opinions, I'm no different so while the media were saying he was Man on the Match against Newcastle United, I saw him receive the ball under no pressure, only to turn and pass bacwards back behind the half way line to a full-back, simply to get given the ball back almost immediately 10 yards furthe back. That happened several times and sums him up for me. happy passing sideways and backwards but offers little going forward.

Statistically he passes forward 57.27% of the time but he is supposed to be the more attacking of the two defensive midfielders, the link man, the role Ryan Mason plays. The same statistic for Mason and the more defensive Nabil Bentaleb, 68.19% and 62.03% respectively. They seem to confirm my impression., he likes to give responsibility to someone else, that's not the hallmark of the mentality we need.



Etienne Capoue has been left to rot basically. he had an outburst under Tim Sherwood, complaining that the English didn't understand foreigners, then he showed himself to be too slow on the ball, against our foreign managers wishes, before siding with Adebayor against the youth in November. Result, banishment. Whatever his statistics (67.05%) are we all know he will be offloaded in the summer.



That leaves us with Benjamin Stambouli, who being French needs to be playing first team football with the European Championships in France on the horizon. He has proved so far to be nothing more than average. His forward passing statistic to be consistent with the rest is 64.37%. The player himself you would expect would want a move to try and force his way into the squad. Do Spurs want to sell? Unknown, but with Capoue certainly up for sale and a desire to get high earners off the books, Paulinho fits that bill better than Stambouli and would command a higher fee also, important if we want to make purchases.

For those of you shouting Tom carroll at me, I believe he'll be sold, he isn't a regular in the Swansea side so isn't an upgrade on what we have. he could of course come back as a squad player, playing the Europa League and Cup competitions.

Delli Alli has signed of course so he will be brought along next season, I would have thoughtb at the expense of Carroll. He may well be the better long term prospect as a defensive midfielder, it would however be interesting to know how Carroll would get on in a number 10 role.

The question is will we be offlosding one, two or three defensive midfielders. My guess is two.