€40 million-rated AS Roma defender could be the new spine of Tottenham’s defensive revolution under Frank – Opinion

We have seen how the North Londoners are in need of a defensive reinforcement, especially if Cristian Romero were to leave Tottenham Hotspur this summer given his links with a move to Spain. And this has had Daniel Levy dipping into the transfer market for a new centre-back, and the 63-year-old club chairman has landed on multiple names given the Lilywhites’ link with a move for the likes of Marc Guehi and Jarrod Branthwaite. But the latest news emerging from the rumour mill suggests that Spurs have now been moving for Evan Ndicka, who has been consistent with his performances for a couple of seasons in Serie A.

Tottenham are said to have been left very impressed with the 25-year-old, who has been putting in some impressive shifts for the Gialorossi since moving to the club in a free transfer from Eintracht Frankfurt two years ago.

This is not the first time we have been hearing about the North Londoners’ interest in Ndicka; if we walk back to April, there were reports from TBR Football linking the North Londoners with a move for him, and given how the links have resurfaced again, it does look like Levy holds a strong interest in his signature.

Evan Ndicka would be ideal for Frank’s Tottenham

Now if I am looking into the left-footed 25-year-old, he is not your “modern ball-playing defender”, but instead he is someone who is an intelligent presence at the back who is adaptable in the centre-back role and thrives when playing in a structured environment. And in a way this is what makes him ideal to play in the system that we are expecting Thomas Frank to implement at Tottenham.

The Dane head coach likes to play in a structural manner where he pushes to play with flexibility. Let me take a look at his Brentford for a while, which, by the way, was used as a measure for studying the balance of playing in pragmatism but with ambition, given how he deployed a flexible setup that shifted between 4-3-3, 3-5-2, and 5-3-2 depending on opponent and the sequences that the game state demanded. One thing that’s been a constant in all those formations is that his teams are defensively very solid and excelled in playing directly through transitions.

If I am talking about it, we can go back to his playing days in Germany, where he played as the left CB in Frankfurt’s back three, and we have seen Frank use a similar backline at Brentford. And it’s not going to be like Ange Postecoglou’s system that demands recovery pace. Under Frank, the Dane likes to push on defensive IQ and emphasise positioning, and this is something Ndicka is good at as well.

Moreover, given his frame and build, he could also be a key cog from the set pieces, something that Tottenham were lacking in the previous campaign, while it is something that is supposed to be a key piece under Thomas.

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Author Opinion

While if the North Londoners would have signed him under Ange Postecoglou, he would have been more of a deputy in the Australian head coach’s high-line system, but now Evan Ndicka can be the foundation of the defensive rebuild at Hotspur Way under Thomas Frank given how his traits are ideal for a system that brings emphasis on structure and strategic positioning. And to me, he is far from a short-term solution; Ndicka is rather a longer-term arrival if Daniel Levy can get this one over the line.