Ange’s praise for Vicario: “He’s been brilliant from day one”
Sun 24 December 2023, 10:45|
Tottenham Hotspur
Ange Postecoglou described Guglielmo Vicario’s display in our 2-1 win against Everton as ‘outstanding’ and was full of praise for how quickly the goalkeeper has adapted to the Premier League.
‘Vic’ and our defence stood strong under intense pressure, particularly aerially, as Everton chased for a share of the spoils at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Saturday. We started brilliantly and went 2-0 up through Richarlison and Heung-Min Son but Everton pushed on in the second half, pulled a goal back through Andre Gomes on 18 minutes and Vic had to be at his absolute best to tip over a deflected shot from Arnaut Danjuma, who was on loan here last season. We held on for an important 2-1 victory.
Signed from Empoli in Italy this summer, Vic is an ever-present in the Premier League with 18 out of 18 appearances so far, he’s made 57 saves – he’s been up for the Premier League’s Save of the Month every month this season - 23 sweeper clearances and, most notably, no errors leading to goals. Often the base for our play out from the back, he’s also made 659 passes in those 18 matches.
Asked on our Review Show how impressed he’d been with how quickly Vic had settled in, Ange told us: “Yes, and we haven’t given him easy challenges. A lot of games we haven’t really needed him, maybe one or two saves, but we’ve needed him in terms of his organisation, his distribution - he’s a big part of our build up.
“Today was different, today we actually needed the stuff that he’s really good at, and that’s his goalkeeping, his saves... he has a great temperament, nothing really fazes him, whatever challenge there is, he’s up for it.”
Ange also spoke about Vic, now a regular in the Italy squad, in his post-match press conference. “Vic was outstanding today with a couple of brilliant saves,” he said. “He’s been brilliant from day one for us, and we haven’t always needed him like we did today.
“Other times, it’s probably one or two saves a game, if that, he’s been important in our build-up and in our organisation, but today we needed his goalkeeping. It wasn’t just the saves he makes. They’re so strong from corners and put so much pressure on the goalkeeper, and I thought he stood up really well.”
