Tottenham Hotspur cruised to a 5-0 away win over Southampton on Sunday evening, with all of their goals coming in the first-half in a huge result for Ange Postecoglou's men - but it's one star's exploits in defence that may have gone unnoticed that has helped Spurs out in recent days.
The north London outfit had only won one of their previous eight games prior to the visit to the south coast, and they blew Russell Martin's men away with three goals in the opening 15 minutes - and when James Maddison made it 5-0 on the stroke of half-time, the home crowd had started to make their way home. But it wasn't just the scoring that was impressive, with Tottenham limiting the rock-bottom side to just three shots on target - and youngster Archie Gray has had a huge say in that, which could lead club chiefs to put their search for a new defender on hold.
Archie Gray Has Massively Impressed For Tottenham So Far
The young utility player looks to be a shrewd buy already
Gray joined Tottenham from Leeds United in the summer for a fee of around £40million, after failing to win promotion from the Championship with the Yorkshire outfit - and although he has been made to wait for starts in the capital, he's started to have a more prominent role within the first-team in recent weeks.
A first-ever Premier League start against Bournemouth earlier in the month saw Gray feature the full ninety at right-back, and he's also featured in the brace of League Cup wins over Coventry City and Manchester City - but the majority of his minutes have come in the Europa League, where he has failed to miss a single minute on the continent.
However, what stood out about Gray's performance against Southampton was that he featured at centre-back. Gray had featured at the heart of defence in the Europa League win over Ferencvaros back in early October, but against a low-ranked opponent, there wasn't much of a test as Spurs won 2-1 in Hungary.
The past three days have seen the 'phenomenal' star feature twice in the middle of Postecoglou's back four - and at the age of just 18, he handled an intense Rangers crowd well, as the Light Blues laid siege to their goal - standing firm and sharing a 1-1 draw in Scotland.
Tottenham May Have Saved Millions With Gray Purchase
His ability to slot in all over the pitch is worth its weight in golddust
The same occurred tonight. With first-choice goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario out injured alongside Ben Davies, Cristian Romero and Micky van de Ven - who are the club's first three choices at centre-back - Gray has been relied upon to sit in front of Fraser Forster and quash any attacks.
He did that with relative ease. As per Sofascore, Gray registered a 7.3 rating - the seventh-highest rated player in Tottenham's lineup - though with his age and his lack of familiarity with his position, that must be taken into consideration. Gray registered two blocks, an interception and one tackle - whilst he also won both of his ground duels, and only lost possession four times, from a possible 101 touches. Beyond that, the young English prodigy produced two accurate long balls from four - and produced the most passes from any player on either side with 90.
GIVEMESPORT Key Statistic: Archie Gray scored on his debut for England's under-21 side back in March.
It means that Tottenham may not have to buy a centre-back to recover from their injuries to Romero and Van de Ven. A lot has been made of Postecoglou losing his best defenders to injury and with there being no return date yet, there's every chance that the Aussie boss could opt to play the teenage sensation to clean up at the back.