Tottenham vs AS Monaco: Erik Lamela ready to work the big stage at Wembley and fulfil his destiny with Spurs

Stepping up: Lamela celebrates his goal in the opening day of the season clash with Everton
Jan Kruger/Getty Images
Tom Collomosse13 September 2016

When Tottenham paid a club-record £30million to sign Erik Lamela from Roma three years ago, occasions like tomorrow’s Champions League match at Wembley were precisely what they had in mind.

With a crowd close to the 90,000 capacity — a record for a Tottenham ‘home’ game — expected at the national stadium for the club’s opening Group E fixture against Monaco, Lamela will sense this is the season he fulfils his destiny.

Tottenham’s only other Champions League campaign, in 2010-11, ended with a surprise quarter-final place as Gareth Bale’s sparkling performances carried them past Inter Milan and AC Milan before Real Madrid prevailed in the last eight.

When Bale left for Madrid in 2013 for a then world-record fee of £85.3m, Lamela — another left-footed wide attacker with a good scoring record — was supposed to recreate the Welshman’s magic.

“I think I was born to play football,” said Lamela when, as a richly-talented 12-year-old with River Plate, he was interviewed in October 2004 for a television documentary. “I may have been taught to play, but everyone is born for something. This is what I was born to do.”

Perhaps, but who would have bet on Lamela making it this far at Tottenham? His first season was a write-off, as a back injury and problems adapting to English life and football — not to mention two managers (Andre Villas-Boas and Tim Sherwood) who did not fancy him — restricted him to just 17 appearances and a single goal.

Tottenham thought long and hard about selling Lamela in the summer of 2015. Roma were interested in taking him back, while Inter Milan and Juventus were keen. In the closing days of that transfer window, he might have gone to Marseille on an initial loan deal.

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A year later, Lamela is one of Tottenham’s key attacking players. Such has been his improvement that rather than finding a buyer for him, Spurs’s intention is to extend his contract. Lamela earns close to £70,000 a week and his current deal has two years to run, with an option for a third.

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While Mauricio Pochettino, a fellow Argentine, must take some credit for Lamela’s progress, team-mate Jan Vertonghen spotted the signs before Pochettino even arrived at the club.

When Lamela had his back problems, keeping him out of action for five months, Vertonghen was struggling with a damaged ankle. The pair spent much time together in rehabilitation and Belgium defender Vertonghen was struck by Lamela’s desire to deliver.

“In his first season, I had some injuries and so did he,” Vertonghen recalled. “He wanted it so badly. He just wanted to play so much and he pushed himself very hard, perhaps a bit too hard.

“Now he has been fully fit for two years and he is showing us how important he is. If he doesn’t play, we feel his absence.

“He is an unbelievable player now. Even if he is not scoring or creating goals, he works so hard for the team and I’m very happy he is still here. He never wanted to go back to Italy. He is a soldier and that is why he fits so perfectly into this team. He is maybe the hardest-working player in the squad and he is mentally very strong.”

It is these qualities, rather than the flair for which Lamela was celebrated at River Plate and Roma, which have enabled him to settle and succeed in England.

Although his most memorable moment for Tottenham remains the ‘rabona’ goal in a Europa League tie against Asteras Tripolis in October 2014, it is not the most representative. Today’s Lamela is all energy, racing into tackles and tracking back to help full-backs Kyle Walker and Danny Rose.

Indeed, he has formed a firm friendship with Rose, to the extent Lamela mocked his team-mate for questioning whether Tottenham were good enough to finish in the top four last season.

“Erik has that mean streak you need to be successful,” said a Tottenham source. “It’s not easy, moving countries at a young age, but Erik has done it twice and made it work.

“He is an extremely professional guy who just lives for football — but it’s wrong to say there has been any favouritism from the manager. He just picks the best players.”

During that 2004 Trans World Sport documentary, the young Lamela dreamed of dominating the European stage.

Will this be the season he makes that dream come true?

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