Jamie Carragher singles out Thomas Frank signing who's 'not good enough' for Tottenham

Chelsea bulldozed past Tottenham Hotspur at the weekend, and Jamie Carragher has laid the blame at the feet of one of Thomas Frank's summer signings

Jamie Carragher has slammed Joao Palhinha for his performance during Tottenham Hotspur's 1-0 defeat to Chelsea. The 30-year-old midfielder, who the Lilywhites signed from Bayern Munich on loan in the summer, failed to impress at the weekend, raising questions about his ability at the highest level.

Even with the help of Rodrigo Bentancur, Pape Matar Sarr and Xavi Simons, Spurs were overrun in the middle of the park. Enzo Fernandez and Moises Caicedo were often joined by one of Malo Gusto and Reece James, who inverted to assist build-up and provide defensive stability.

Speaking on Sky Sports' Monday Night Football show, Carragher singled out Palhinha for his reluctance to play forwards. Pulling no punches, the former Liverpool defender said: "We spoke about courage; now we can talk about quality.

"Palhinha hasn’t got the quality. For a player playing for Tottenham in central midfield, for me, that’s a pass you have to be able to make. He can’t make it.

"So even though I’m being critical of it, saying he hasn’t quite got the ability, he’s actually done okay for Tottenham in terms of his job, but they go back, listen to the boos. The only reason he does a clever turn on the ball is because of the boos.

"Again, Palhinha is on the ball, five touches because he hasn’t got the confidence or the ability. [Kevin] Danso now takes seven touches. They’re not good enough on the ball, you now get a situation where [Pedro] Porro is getting the ball, getting closed down, and Xavi Simons is in that position there.

"What you’ve got is you’ve got a lack of courage and confidence from certain players, but you’ve also got a lack of ability of certain players."

David Jones asked Carragher if Tottenham's biggest problem is not having a player capable of breaking the lines. The Sky Sports pundit replied: "That’s the problem. And for me, for Thomas Frank, that is something he’s got to grow.

"A worry would be, one of his first signings is Palhinha. Now, he is not capable, I don’t think, of doing this. There was a reason why players and teams in the Premier League didn’t buy him from Fulham, and there’s a reason why Bayern Munich bought him and didn’t play him, so that would be a worry.

"But for Thomas Frank, going forward, when you think of pragmatic managers in the past who’ve made that jump from a smaller club to a bigger club, that has always been the problem in terms of, can they coach the rotations, the build-up play, to break the lines?"

Speaking to reporters on Monday ahead of Tottenham's clash against Copenhagen in the Champions League, Frank commented on whether there's an expectation to play a certain way at home. The Spurs boss said: "That’s different types of games, sometimes also everything accumulating, the number you gave is not a fantastic number.

"We haven’t won at home in the last whatever games in the Premier League, not too many, but completely different games. Some teams are very different teams to play against, others a little bit easier.

"Everything is difficult, but for example Villa I think very good comparative performance. Unfortunately we lost, we just got it wrong, but we easily could have won that 1-0.

"And I think Saturday night is an accumulation of a lot of things. A big London derby. We always hope we can beat them. We haven’t beaten them for a long time and we didn’t so that’s just added a bit."

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