View: Ancelotti must put faith in Nkounkou after Delph’s struggles at Burnley
Niels Nkounkou is a player that has a lot of Everton fans excited this season, with the youngster on the verge of a full first-team breakthrough.
Carlo Ancelotti is known to rate the young left-back very highly, but supporters are yet to see much of him in action.
Nkounkou was handed his Premier League debut against Newcastle back at the beginning of November but has not been seen since.
The Italian’s hand may be forced this weekend when his former side Chelsea travel to Goodison Park, following the injury Fabian Delph sustained at Burnley on Saturday.
Regardless of the injury, Delph’s performance during the first half shows exactly why it is time to put more faith in the young defender while Lucas Digne remains sidelined.
Delph out of his depth
Prior to the hamstring injury that forced the former Manchester City man off inside the first 30 minutes, Delph was hardly inspiring for Everton at Turf Moor.
Utilised as a left wing-back, Delph was out of position and out of his comfort zone. As per Wyscout, 62.5% of his passes were backwards and of the few forward passes he attempted, just one was accurate.
According to Wyscout, he also failed to make a single progressive run, which epitomised his lacklustre and negative performance in the first half.
While he is a player of vast experience, the statistic reflects that of a player who is playing out of position.
Compare that to the single Premier League appearance that Nkounkou made, he attempted 10 forward passes against Newcastle, completed 100% of his passes into the final third and registered two progressive runs – as per Wyscout.
You cannot ignore the small sample size, but it does give Ancelotti an insight into the positive influence that playing a natural left-back in that position could have on the Toffees.
In other Everton news, the Toffees involved in race to sign Reading youngster Michael Olise