Peter Crouch has said that it is now clear that dealing with set pieces is a clear weakness for Tottenham’s number one Guglielmo Vicario.
Vicario has had an outstanding debut season in the Premier League, with many pundits even nominating the Spurs star for the Team of the Season so far (Alan Shearer- GiveMeSport).
However, teams are now seemingly trying to target Tottenham number one on set-pieces, with none doing so more compressively than Everton on Saturday.
Sean Dyche’s men put men around Vicario during each one of the corner kicks, making it difficult for the Italian to come off his line and the strategy worked, with the goalkeeper being all at sea for the Toffees’ opener.
Vicario needs to work on set-pieces at Tottenham
Crouch believes that we have now seen a clear pattern with the 27-year-old over the past few weeks, which points to a weakness in set-pieces.
The former Tottenham striker told TNT Sports 1 (3/2/24) about the goalkeeper following Spurs’ 2-2 draw at Goodison Park: “I think it’s a chink in his armour. I think he’s been amazing since he’s been at the club. He’s a fantastic goalkeeper but that seems to be an issue.
“He dropped it against Man City, against Brentford at times he had a slight issue with that and again today he couldn’t handle it when Harrison backed into him. For whatever reason it wasn’t done in the second half because they let him off because it’s definitely an issue for him.”
His fellow pundit, Joe Cole, was in agreement and he questioned why Tottenham did not get a blocker in to protect Vicario.
The former Chelsea man said: “He’s a young goalkeeper so he’s going to learn. From an organisational perspective, Tottenham could bring a player from a different area and say your job is to clear the path.
“Not foul him you get a blocker in and his job is to clear the way and Vicario has got to be brave and come for crosses. I don’t want to be too critical because I think he’s been outstanding but there are areas for him to improve.”
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I found it inexplicable that no Spurs player got between Harrison and Vicario and tried to block off the Everton man even though it was evident that the goalkeeper was struggling to cope with the extra attention.
If the players on the pitch were not taking it upon themselves to do that, surely one of the coaching staff should have asked them to do so.