Ex-Tottenham player and manager Glenn Hoddle believes that Timo Werner might have enjoyed an entirely different Chelsea career if it wasn’t for VAR. The German forward has since joined Spurs on a loan-to-buy deal from RB Leipzig in the hope of truly making an impact in the Premier League.
Tottenham have been the busiest of the ‘Big Six’ clubs so far this month, with Ange Postecoglou being rewarded for guiding his side to an impressive start to the season. Spurs managed to bolster their defensive ranks with the signing of Radu Dragusin from Genoa for a fee in the region of £26million, fending off a rival bid from Bayern Munich to secure his signature.
Postecoglou’s side then hijacked Manchester United’s pursuit of Werner to lure him to north London, and he has featured in both matches since putting pen to paper with his new side.
Tottenham opting to give the versatile attacker a second chance in England came as a surprise to many, though former England manager Hoddle believes that Spurs may have completed a smart piece of business if they can instil belief in the 27-year-old.
Speaking exclusively to Express Sport as part of Well Pharmacy’s Blood Pressure United campaign, which is encouraging football fans to have their blood pressures tested, Hoddle explained: “I think looking at him signing, my eyebrows were raised, I thought it was a strange one. I could never envisage Spurs going for him at the time.
“But, in saying that, I covered a lot of his games when he first went to Chelsea and – he will know better than I will – I recall he scored about four or five goals where he was fractionally offside and VAR perhaps changed his Chelsea career. There were a lot of goals that were chalked off where he was just offside and I thought to myself, ‘I wonder if that would be a completely different story if those goals had remained’.
