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#3 Kyle Walker-Peters
It’s hard to pinpoint what’s gone wrong for young Tottenham right-back Kyle Walker-Peters this season outside of him suffering a badly-timed injury. The summer of 2019 saw Spurs sell first-choice right-back Kieran Trippier to Atletico Madrid, and when they didn’t sign a replacement, it felt like Walker-Peters – a U-20 World Cup winner in 2017 with England – would finally be given a run in the first team.
That’s exactly what happened, as Walker-Peters started the season in Mauricio Pochettino’s first XI, performing admirably in Spurs’ first two Premier League matches against Aston Villa and Manchester City. He suffered a hamstring injury in his third match, though – the 0-1 defeat to Newcastle in August – and since then he’s been seen just once, in the diabolical 0-0 draw with Colchester in the EFL Cup.
Quite why this is, only Pochettino knows. Since then, the massively inconsistent Serge Aurier has been used as Tottenham’s first choice in the position, while others such as Davinson Sanchez and Juan Foyth have also been given a shot as potential replacements for Trippier.
Walker-Peters meanwhile has been left in the cold – despite running up better statistics in tackles, clearances, blocks and passing success than Aurier in his brief appearances at the beginning of the season.
It appears that Pochettino simply doesn’t have faith in the youngster – which is why a loan move in January would make sense for all parties. It’d be a chance for Walker-Peters to prove his worth with a longer run in a starting XI, and it’d be a risk-free opportunity for Pochettino and Spurs to see whether they might already have the solution to a problem position on their books.
Given his experience, a move down to the EFL Championship might not make sense, so for Walker-Peters perhaps a loan move abroad, if it becomes available, could work better.
