Tottenham Hotspur were beaten by Nottingham Forest in the Carabao Cup on Wednesday night.
Talksport pundit Jamie O’Hara has now criticised summer signing Yves Bissouma for his mediocre performance against Forrest in the League Cup.
The former Tottenham player believes that the 26-year-old has not been the same player he was at Brighton and Hove Albion since his move to Tottenham. Bissouma has struggled to hold down a regular starting berth at Tottenham and it will be interesting to see if he can turn his career around in the coming months.
“Bissouma, for me, the player that we signed from Brighton ain’t the player that’s turned up at Tottenham, that’s for sure,” he told talkSPORT.
“As a football player, you know you might not start every week. When you get an opportunity, you’ve got to take it, you’ve got to have confidence in yourself. And you go: ‘right, now’s my chance. Carabao Cup, I’m going to get an opportunity. I’m going to show the gaffer what I’m about tonight’. And you come out and you put in a performance like that tonight, what do you expect? You’re going to be sat on the bench.”
The Malian defensive midfielder has been behind the likes of Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg and Rodrigo Bentancur in the pecking order and he will have to earn the trust of manager Antonio Conte in order to cement his place in the starting lineup.
There is no doubt that Bissouma is a top class player who could be an asset for Tottenham in the long run. He had established himself as one of the best defensive midfielders in the league before his move to Tottenham.
His quality cannot be doubted but it seems that the player is struggling to adapt to his new surroundings. When Tottenham signed him for a fee of around £25 million, the transfer was considered as a major bargain.
It remains to be seen whether Conte can help him settle into the club over the next few months and get back to his peak form.
