Tottenham Hotspur have been ravished by injuries this season. At times, Mauricio Pochettino has had little choice with his selection this season, so to hear the news that Kieran Trippier’s knock against Crystal Palace wasn’t a serious one was great news. However, whether Trippier is fit or not, he should be left out on Saturday for Chelsea’s visit to Wembley in favour of Serge Aurier.
The Ivorian international has made just seven appearances for Tottenham this season, three in the Premier League, two in the Champions League and two in the Carabao Cup. However, when he went away on international duty a lot of fans believed he’d be coming back and get thrown in the deep end, tasked with stopping both Eden Hazard and Marcos Alonso against Chelsea, leaving a lot of Lilywhites fearing they’d be torn to pieces.
Instead of being worried about what Hazard can do to them, Tottenham fans should start thinking about how many they’ll be putting past Chelsea when Aurier does a number on Hazard. The sometimes rash defender has certainly had his moments at Tottenham, but he’s matured over the last few months and after captaining his country and grinding out two draws to keep his nation undefeated in their AFCON qualifying group, he’s proved that he can be trusted.
Aurier wears the armband well for his nation and despite issues that have cropped up in his past about his behaviour on and off the pitch, the 25-year-old seems to have benefitted from playing under Mauricio Pochettino and now he could be set to kick on in his career in North London and show the world that Poch was right to give him a chance as he aims to usurp Trippier as the number on choice on the right of Tottenham’s back line.
If he can step up and perform as he did against Central African Republic and Guinea in his nations AFCON qualifiers, where he grabbed an assist and a clean sheet across his 180 minutes on the pitch, then there’s no doubting he’ll be able to keep Eden Hazard and Marcos Alonso quiet down Chelsea’s left flank, and when you nullify the way Chelsea go down the left, there’s little that the Blues can do in the way of hurting you.
