Former Tottenham striker Roberto Soldado has revealed that he has never quite managed to get over his failure to make an impact at the club.
Spurs bought Soldado from Valencia in the summer of 2013 for a fee of £26 million and the striker arrived with a big reputation having had three prolific seasons in La Liga (BBC).
However, things failed to click for him at Spurs after the Spanish international scored just three goals in open play in two seasons (transfermarkt).
The 34-year-old, who is enjoying somewhat of a resurgence this season in his role of captain of the newly promoted Granada side, has admitted that the time he spent in North London still troubles him.
Speaking about his time at Tottenham, the forward told inews: “It’s like a thorn in my side and always will be as I wasn’t able to find a solution and give my best performance.
“A lot of times with Diego here (Granada coach, Diego Martinez), when we’re talking about football and we discuss the Premier League, he says to me, ‘You’re still screwed up by the time you had there’.
“I couldn’t find my best level there and the more I think about it, the more it annoys me.”
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Soldado revealed that he tried to tweak the way he played in order to better suit the Premier League but lost confidence after he failed to perform as expected.
He also opened up on how difficult it was for him to not be able to perform at his best.
The striker added: “I changed my way of playing because I knew what I’d done in Spain wouldn’t work.
“[At Valencia] I was the reference point in attack but the physical aspect with defenders here isn’t the same as in England, where they’re much stronger.
“I knew I’d suffer a bit and had to come out of the box more. I had to participate more and when it came to the penalty box perhaps I wasn’t getting where I should have been.
“I’d be turning all this over in my head and I got to a point where I was lost. In the second year I said to myself, ‘I can’t do this any more, I’ve been an important player in Spain and I can’t be here any more’.
“I’d got lost as a player and needed to go back to La Liga.”
Spurs Web Opinion
While Soldado was pretty dreadful for us over those two years, I don’t remember too many fans getting on his back. Most Spurs fans wanted him to succeed as he was a great guy and worked his socks off on the pitch. Unfortunately, it was evident from pretty early on that it wasn’t going to work out for him in the Premier League.
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