SPURS: DAWSON UNIMPRESSED WITH NEW SIGNING

New Tottenham Hotspur right-back Emerson Royal has a lot of work to do to win over Michael Dawson who has been unimpressed with his performances for the North London club since they paid £25m to sign from Catalan giants Barcelona at the start of the season. North London rivals  Arsenal were one of the clubs in the race to sign Emerson before Spurs reached an agreement to sign the Brazilian international last summer.

Ex-Spurs and Hull City central defender Michael Dawson was on Sky Sports last week Saturday and he talked about the former Real Betis man. According to him, Emerson Royal has been a disappointment till date. The criticism from Michael Dawson came on the back of his errors during the home defeat to Southampton in the Premier League last week. Emerson was faulted for the final two Southampton goals during the game which ended in a 3-2 defeat for his team.

Tottenham Hotspur came into the Southampton game on the back of a 2-0 London Derby defeat to Chelsea with goals from Hakim Ziyech and Thiago Silva in the second half. Spurs took the lead in the first half of the Southampton game through a Jan Bednarek own goal, but they were ahead for just three minutes before Chelsea loanee Armando Broja scored for the visiting team as the two teams went into the break with a 1-1 scoreline. Son Heung-Min scored a second goal for Tottenham Hotspur in the 70^th minute before Emerson produced two aerial errors to let Southampton turn the game around with two goals in the last ten minutes to secure a famous win at the new Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.

It was not surprising that Emerson was dropped by Spurs manager Antonio Conte for the next game, a 2-0 home loss to fellow Champions League chasers Wolverhampton Wanderers thus taking their losing run to three matches in the Premier League.