Holtby Proving He’s More Than Just “Lucky”

This summer saw the arrival of seven new players, three of whom came in that glorious Friday Transfer Frenzy. During the course of this £100 million transfer outlay, one player became rather forgotten. The German international Lewis Holtby, who arrived last January, six months earlier than planned for a cut price fee.

Reports from the Bundesliga praised the former German under-21 captain playmaking skills and the fact he had been capped for the full German team, which is no modest achievement considering their current wealth of options.

With Lucky Lewis’ deal being moved forward it seemed that the expectations were too much for Holtby to cope with. He developed a tendency to almost try too hard when in possession of the ball, and was often caught trying unnecessary flicks and tricks to make the immediate impact that was expected.

The half-season Holtby played with the club was in general rather average. This year, with his preseason interrupted by injury, and a host of other midfield options arriving at the club, it seemed that Holtby’s playing time was to be significantly reduced. However, since scoring a great goal for the u21 side Holtby has provided Spurs with great impact performances this season, despite often being used as a late substitute.

The German’s first game back was during a 3-0 home victory against Dinamo Tblisi. Throughout this fixture and the next few Holtby has shown great vision and creativity for picking out passes and threading balls between the opposition defences. In this game he provide a perfectly weighted through ball for Defoe, and topped off a fine performance with a long ranged effort into the top corner.

Even with these good performances, Holtby has had to play second fiddle to Christian Eriksen. The Dane who sparkled in his debut against Norwich, has made that role his own, with Holtby clearly AVB’s alternative. Holtby has yet to start a Premier League game this season, and instead is relying on the Europa League and Capital One Cup to prove his worth.

In the frist group game of the Europa League Tottenham lined up in a 4-2-3-1 formation, with Erik Lamela playing as an inverted forward on the right, and with Holtby and Gylfi Sigurdsson rotating positions in the left and centre.

Tottenham managed a possession stat of 66% and produced a total number of 17 shots compared to Tromso’s two. As seen from the chalk boards, Holtby saw a lot of the ball, often coming deep to collect it from the defenders and spread play successfully higher up the pitch.

Perhaps what is more noticeable is Holtby’s ability to play forward passes, perhaps more so because in the first few games of the season Mousa Dembele offered little creativity in the final third. During the game he played three passes which resulted in goal scoring opportunities, with Jermain Defoe’s shot being saved by the Tromso keeper but with one leading to an assist.

Most of his failed passes were small flicks, quick interchanges, and threaded balls showing good vision and knowledge, but just lacking the execution.

The next fixture after this Europa League game was against Cardiff and as expected Eriksen kept his place off of an impressive debut and wonder goal in the Tromso fixture. Holtby only came on in the 89th minute in this game with Spurs chasing a goal to clinch a 0-1 away victory.

Despite this game being where Holtby clocked in the least time on the pitch, it was probably his most influential recent game as his creativity often opened the Cardiff back line.

Here Holtby was accurate with 100% of his passes and managed to create two great opportunities with his limited minutes, with one ending up as a goal. The first was a threaded ball into Paulinho, whose shot was saved by the Cardiff keeper.

The other came from a long ball that Lamela had challenged in the air; Holtby picked up the loose ball and played Lamela through who assisted Paulinho for the winning goal.

With just 4 minutes played Holtby will a key player in this match and perhaps one of the most influential.

As expected, Holtby started again in the League Cup fixture against Aston Villa, which means that Eriksen will probably start in the upcoming derby versus Chelsea. This cup game was a comfortable 0-4 away win at Villa Park where Tottenham once again dominated proceedings.

Holtby started as a central attacking midfielder with Harry Kane and Lamela playing alongside him in midfield. Once again ‘the cup combination’ of Defoe and Holtby got Spurs the victory. This was a game where the German was again instrumental to Spurs’ attack and often retained possession.

Holtby provided three assists in the game, one a chipped ball met by a Defoe header, the second a corner that was ‘karate kicked’ in by Paulinho, and the third was a pass to Defoe after he had won possession.

Holtby’s third assist is probably one that reflects a lot about his game. He is a tenacious player and often fancies himself in a deeper role. He did achieve success in this role at times last season, in particular assisting a stunning Defoe finish against Man City and also playing a very neat and tidy game against Everton.

We have yet to see this side of Holtby’s game this season as he has been featured as a central attacking midfielder. However, I believe that Holtby has been spurred on by the arrival of Eriksen and that Andre Villas-Boas’ mantra of competition for places has Holtby showing many of the traits he displayed in Germany.

Hopefully through regular cup minutes, and impact substitute league appearances Lucky can have a successful first full season with the club. I personally would like to see an attacking midfield three of Holtby, Eriksen, and Lamela.

I believe that with Lamela playing as an inside forward on the right, and the other two rotating down the left and through the middle we would be able to unlock many defences through creativity and the full back overlapping.

One thing is for sure, whether it be Holtby, Sigurdsson, or Eriksen starting as our central attacking midfielder we definitely do possess great strength in depth.

[author name=”Jai B” avatar=”https://si0.twimg.com/profile_images/1659352356/IMAG0018.jpg” twitter=”Jai_B” tag=”JaiB[/linequote]