The future of Christian Eriksen – Thomas Frank will be decided in the summer
Brentford manager Thomas Frank says Christian Eriksen’s future will be decided at the end of the season.
riksen’s short-term contract expires at the end of the current season and his performances for the Bees in recent weeks will have attracted the attention of some of Europe’s biggest clubs.
Tottenham will be one of them and the Dane showed his former club what they were missing as he was the most creative player on the pitch in Saturday night’s 0-0 draw, dealing a serious blow to Spurs’ Champions League hopes meant.
Christian Eriksen signs autographs for fans at the end of the game against Tottenham (Adam Davy/PA).
Frank is keen for Eriksen to stay in west London but says a decision will be made when this campaign is over.
“I’d like to say I’m confident, I’m very positive and very hopeful that he will stay, but it will be a decision at the end of the season,” he said.
“I’ll do what I can, but it’s up to Christian, where it’s like everything when you decide to go to this club or another, buy this house or another, take this job or another.
“There has to be pros and cons, and I always say if you make an eight-two decision where you have eight ups and two downs, then you’re in a good position.
“I hope Christian makes the right choice for him and his family and I really hope we will be.”
Spurs would have loved Eriksen at their side at Brentford Community Stadium as they lacked attacking creativity and went through a second straight game without registering a shot on goal.
Harry Kane and Tottenham drew a gap at Brentford (Adam Davy/PA)
The Denmark international, whose recovery from cardiac arrest last summer was a miracle, created both of Brentford’s best chances when Ivan Toney hit the woodwork twice from set pieces.
Spurs boss Antonio Conte, who previously said he would be open to working with Eriksen again after dating at Inter Milan, chose not to discuss the possibility of a summer move.
“First of all, it made me happy to see Christian play and play in this way,” said Conte. “You know very well to now talk about players who are not in my team through the transfer market. I think it’s a lack of respect for the team the player is playing for and also for my players.
“Sure, I worked with him for two years at Inter Milan and I enjoyed that. I’m very happy to see him in such fantastic form because don’t forget what happened just eight months ago. Now I’m happy to see Christian play football at this level.”
Having scored 12 goals in their last three games, Spurs have gone without a shot on goal in consecutive games and Conte says it’s down to their free style of goals.
“I think we fought offensively in the last two games because we found two teams that are very good defensively,” he said.
Antonio Conte, left, gives instructions to his Tottenham team (Adam Davy/PA)
“Without the ball, these two teams defended very deeply, with the whole team, with all their players.
“When you come across that type of situation, you have to create the space, also to have players who can beat their man one-on-one to create the dominance.
“I think that’s an aspect we’re working on – this week, after the Brighton game, we’ve been working on that aspect to try and find 10 players behind the ball in training.
“In the end I think that’s a consequence when you score a lot of goals, you start to become a dangerous team and the opponents are more careful. They try to be more balanced when facing you.
“I think we wanted to get three points today but the draw was fair and we have to accept that result and try to keep working and improving in the situations where we can improve.”
Frank said of his team’s performance: “We got a result, but we should have gotten an even better result. We should have won, I think we deserved to win the game.”
https://www.independent.ie/sport/soccer/christian-eriksens-future-will-be-decided-in-summer-thomas-frank-41581219.html The future of Christian Eriksen – Thomas Frank will be decided in the summer