We’ve been here before with Erik Lamela.
Eye-catching pre-season form, followed by a promising start to the new campaign and the increasing belief within Tottenham Hotspur fans that the Argentine midfielder will finally see the job through.
And then it happens. First he’s mysteriously left out of the squad. Then we’re told it is a minor injury. Then he disappears for six months.
That cycle continued this weekend when Lamela missed the 2-1 defeat to Liverpool with a thigh problem picked up in training.
The 27-year-old was in line to start at Anfield, and in the nine times he has started this season he has contributed three goals and three assists.
He began last season similarly with six goals and two assists before November 28th. He only started five games the rest of the campaign.
In 2016-17, it was two goals and seven assists in 10 starts prior to a hip injury sustained in November, which sidelined him for a whole year. The same thing happened in his debut year at Spurs although he at least made it to December on that occasion, albeit without scoring or assisting.
Even in the only season in which Lamela has remained fit throughout – the 2015-16 pursuit of Leicester City – he suffered a drastic dip in form in, you guessed it, November, managing only two assists and a goal in 19 Premier League appearances between Bonfire Night and the beginning of April.
This is Lamela’s seventh season at Spurs and in four of them he has basically been redundant from this time of year. If he isn’t in the squad at Everton on Sunday, I’ll be getting an alarming feeling of Déjà vu.
