Someone will pick up a decent player relatively cheaply

Player Assessment: Étienne Capoue

The second of the defensive midfield players we take a look at in the Tottenham Hotspur Blog News (THBN) Player Assessment Series is Frenchman Étienne Capoue.

Étienne Capoue

Étienne Capoue joined Spurs from French side Toulouse for £9.68 million (US$14.72m - AUS$19.29m - €13.46m today) in the summer of 2013, one of the Summer Seven who we hoped would take us up to the next level. In the beginning he looked an excellent signing, a player who could get up and down the pitch and will a bit of steel about him.

Before he joined us Barcelona scouted him, Arsenal, Monaco and PSG wanted him, he was a rising star of French football

Things however haven't gone according to plan. To be truthful, it is partly down to him, or so it would appear and partly down to us. I still think he will be an excellent player somewhere, he would probably thrive in an Italian midfield, Napoli made an offer last year, and David Moyes wants him at Real Sociedad. That is not to say he can't play in the Premier League, I'm sure he can. In January Leicester City, Aston Villa and particularly WBA all wanted to sign him on loan.

That deal, that at times looked on the cards, didn't materialise for whatever reason. Now he is clearly available again this window and Tottenham will want to sell, not loan him, with two years left on his contract.

He rather blotted his copy book by saying the English don't understand foreigners when French newspaper L'Equipe suggested Tim Sherwood didn't know enough about him.

"I'm not surprised. That's the English attitude. They don't know foreign players very well. It's tough. I've gone from first-team regular to someone who is putting themselves forward to play. It's the first time I've experienced this."

The message seemed to be that abroad he is guaranteed a first team place and at Tottenham he isn't, that appeared to rankle him and be the problem so he hit out. He had his chance early this season and was a regular but as Jamie Redknapp pointed out for Sky Sports, he will only do things at his pace and that is too slow for Pochettino, Mousa Dembélé has found a similar problem.

After the Stoke City defeat in November, since which Emmanuel Adebayor, Younes Kaboul, Aaron Lennon and Étienne Capoue have hardly played. His statistics from the Premier League show that when he takes on a player his success rate is over 40% below that of Nabil Bentaleb and wins a lesser percentage of his tackles too. It takes him 22 minutes longer to affect an attacking play, over 87 minutes more to create a chance and 67 minutes to play a key pass, hardly surprising then the young Algerian is preferred.

Premier League Games Only

Étienne Capoue
Played: 12
Minutes: 897
Total Passes: 695
Pass Completion: 87.05%
Forward Passes: 67.05%
Key Passes: 4
Key Pass Time: 1 every 224.25 minutes
Chances Created: 4
Chance Creation Time: 1 every 224.25 minutes
Shots: 7
Shot Accuracy: 50%
Goals: 0
Assists: 0
Positive Attacking Action: 1 every 59.80 minutes
(Total Minutes divided by Shots, Goals, Assists, Key passes, Chances Created combined)
Tackles: 55
Tackles Won: 41.82%
Blocks: 3
Interceptions: 29
Clearances: 33
Take On Success: 41.67%
Heading Success: 66.67%
Defensive Action: ! every 13.89 minutes

Previous Assessments

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