October 27, (THEWILL) – Tottenham Hotspur have left Dele Alli and Harry Winks out of their Carabao Cup match against Burnley on Wednesday night.
This comes after Spurs’ manager Nuno Espirito Santo called the game a “final” and said he would be “basically” taking his Premier League squad to Turf Moor.
Alli and Winks are both available, so their absence will be noticed especially after Nuno also hinted that some of his peripheral players would get an opportunity in the fourth-round tie on Wednesday evening.
“We have players that we need, players that are working hard, maybe with the expectation that they will have more minutes, the expectation that they deserve more minutes,” Nuno said.
Alli and Winks are currently on the fringes of the London club, with Dele having been substituted at halftime in the north London derby last month and having not played a minute since. He had started all six of Tottenham’s League games up to that point, and had shown promise in a more withdrawn centre midfield role.
However, Winks has only played 61 minutes in the Premier League this season, with none since being substituted against Crystal Palace in early September. Nuno also kept him out of the squad for Spurs’ previous Carabao Cup match against Wolves.
Alli’s exclusion from tonight’s team comes a year and a day after Nuno’s predecessor Jose Mourinho left the midfielder out of his Premier League trip to Burnley.
Nuno may believe Alli has squandered his Europa League opportunities in recent weeks. At the end of September, he scored a penalty against NS Mura, but he struggled against Vitesse Arnhem on Thursday.
After the 1-0 defeat to Vitesse, Nuno noted that: “Dele started very well in the competition (Premier League) and now he is not in his best moment so it is up to us to get him back in the best moment he can.”
THEWILL recalls that club President Daniel Levy was hesitant to let Alli depart last summer and again in January. However, if the 25-year-old remains on the fringes, there will be more conjecture when the transfer window reopens in the new year.
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
