Tactical Analysis: Is Mousa Dembele still a key figure for Spurs?

Mousa Dembele signed for Spurs from Fulham last season and enjoyed a brilliant debut season under Andre Villas-Boas. This season however there has been some speculation that he might be forced to move the club, after AVB signed new midfielders in the summer and is re-jigging his tactical set-up accordingly. Would offloading a player who looked irreplaceable last season make sense though?
Statistical analysis

	Tackles per game	Defensive actions per game	Passes per game	Pass accuracy	Key passes per game	Dribbles per game
Dembele	2.3	2	39.2	91.4%	1.3	2.4
Capoue	3	8	48.3	89.7%	0.3	1.7
Sandro	0.9*	3	24.1	82.2%	0.3	0.6
Paulinho	2.4	2	50.3	86.3%	1.3	1

A brief analysis of Dembele’s statistics suggest he is still playing quite well. We van see that he has won a god amount of tackles this season, as well as continuing to be excellent at driving out of the midfield with the ball, completing 2.4 dribbles per game thus far. In the latter regard he is clearly the best player here.
It is of course worth noting that Sandro’s stats are skewed as he has made the bulk of his appearances as a sub this season as a result of injury. In spite of that though he still averages more defensive actions per game than Dembele.
Dembele is probably most similar to Paulinho, with both players capable of driving out of midfield with the ball, as well as both players being able to win the ball and use it effectively. In terms of passing though, Paulinho has been a more influential presence with around 11 more passes per game than Dembele. Other than that their stats are quite similar, although Dembele completes more dribbles.
In a defensive regard Etienne Capoue has been the most prolific defender with eight defensive actions per game and the highest tackle’s per game. Capoue did suffer an early injury. One of he or Sandro might be the ideal partner for one of Dembele and Paulinho though, long term.
Where can Dembele fit in?
It looks like AVB wants to play one of Dembele and Paulinho as a box to box player with one of Capoue and Sandro as the defensive presence along side them. This was evident last weekend when Dembele was hauled off at half time in place of Sandro, after a slightly poor 45 minutes. Sandro did well when coming on, making eight defensive actions, including making five interceptions, compared to just three made by Dembele in his 45 minutes of action.
It looks then like AVB prefers Paulinho as his box to box player, rather than Dembele. Paulinho’s action areas graphic from the loss against Newcastle is sort of a classic example of a box-to-box midfielder:

If we compare this to Dembele’s action areas from the same fixture, albeit from a poor half of football, we can see that he was more restrained in his approach:

As we can see he played a deeper role. His box-to-box style is somewhat sacrificed if AVB prefers Paulinho (as he appears to) as the more advanced of the two players. Dembele himself has stated ”The coach (Spurs’ Andre Villas-Boas) has explained that he makes a tactical choice, he wants more defensive players in midfield.’ This again implies that Dembele’s best qualities might be scarified and that AVB wants a better balance in the area as neither Paulinho or Dembele are holding players.
Conclusion
Dembele is a very, very good midfielder. Most Premier League sides would find a role for him in their starting line-ups. The issue at Spurs is that AVB wants just one of Paulinho and Dembele to play in a two man midfield pivot. Paulinho is the favourite as the slightly more forward thinking one, which means Dembele has to be restricted, or dropped. Dembele will probably thus be dropped for Sandro or Capoue who are more natural defensively. That being said Dembele is a great option to have on the bench and in the squad generally. He may not be happy with this though and as such it might be worth checking the mobile odds on whether Dembele might leave Spurs.
     culled from think football