Which ignores my point entirely about games played and your hysterical phrasing.
"Stealing" a wage and/or a squad spot is David Bentley not Erik Lamela.
What is he then?
Much of the butthurt surrounding Lamela is a byproduct of his fee... It was 6 years ago and the club decided to extend his deal since. It's a shame peeps aren't over the price tag by now.
Should Dele only be a bench warmer cos "he only cost 5 mill"?
We have distinct issues with this squad... Once again, despite his detractors getting restless, EL is not a significant one.
To some extent I agree... maybe "stealing" wage is bit harsh.
But that does not change the fact that he is extremely unreliable. I don't care at all about this "nr of EPL games" metric. If you are coming back from injury and getting on for last 3 minutes of the game is not worth anything.
He has played 11 488 minutes for us. That is equivalent of 128 full games.
He has been with us for 6.5 seasons now. That makes total of less than 20 full games across all competitions!
In EPL he has only played for 8013 minutes, that makes equivalent of 89 games. Out of 244 if we count the Burnely game in. So since his arrival he's been involved in 36,5% of playing time.
If we compare it to Son's results - he joined us 2 seasons later.
He has racked up 8585 minutes with that time. Equivalent of 95 games. And been involved in 57% of all the time played. And we all know, he had also slow start to Spurs career. And he's been away for international duty.
But that is all about number of minutes played. Baseline for me is that squad player should be reliable - he should be there to be called upon... you know, like when we were doing bad in EPL in spring. Or now when we could use all the help possible to turn around awful start of the season... but he is not here.
So yea, love the fella, but we need to aim higher if we want to improve. Some of the memories he has given us will live long in the collective memory, but no room to be sentimental in this instance.