Tim Sherwood gave a frank verdict on the club’s latest signing, Pedro Porro, whose Tottenham debut was ‘unbelievably bad’.
Porro, a £42million January signing from Sporting Lisbon, got his first start in a Spurs shirt against Leicester in the Premier League on Saturday, and had a day to forget in a 4-1 loss.
The wing-back was torn to bits by the Foxes, and taken off in the 75th minute with the game already lost.
Rodrigo Bentancur had given manager Antonio Conte’s side the lead before Nampalys Mendy, James Maddison, Kelechi Iheanacho and Harvey Barnes ran riot.
Shortly before Porro was substituted, he was easily beaten by Barnes who put the ball in the net, only to be declared offside.
Sherwood, who managed Spurs between 2013 and 2014, was still stunned, though, and unloaded on the Spaniard on Sky Sports.
“I don’t want to keep picking on the kid but he needs to be relieved of his duties at the moment,” he said.
“I’m giving him the benefit of the doubt because it’s his debut but Pedro Porro is so bad it’s unbelievable.
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“His positioning is disgusting, Barnes and Maddison are destroying him down the left hand side.
“He’s just ran inside him, he hasn’t even seen him, he gets the ball played in and lets him run inside him.”
The former Aston Villa boss then took aim at the club’s recruitment, with £60m record signing Richarlison again nothing more than an option off the bench.
“Daniel Levy said this week they’ve spent a lot of money, yes they have, but their recruitment has been very, very poor and this is the latest addition,” he continued.
“Let’s not make any conclusions yet, but what I’m looking at is a player who doesn’t want to defend, Conte has complained about the defending and this player is struggling to defend, very disappointing.
“I’ve seen him play before, he looks like a decent player going forward, but if you want someone to defend…”
But Porro is ready to fight on.
Sad about this debut,” he tweeted. £Giving up is not an option. Keep your head up.”
Meanwhile, Heung-min Son urged his teammates to learn from the defeat.
“I don’t think [it was complacency]. We came with a good feeling after beating City. The first minute we were really on it. We should be ready and learn something. Today should be a big lesson for us.”
Spurs are next in action on Tuesday when they play Milan in the Champions League last 16.
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