Now 46, Erik is coaching at Hittarps, an amateur team, scouting for his former club Helsingborgs and working as a pundit on Swedish TV – and, like all Spurs fans in Sweden, he’s keeping a close eye on the progress of Lucas and Deki…
Erik on Lucas
Joining us from Swedish Allsvenskan side Djurgarden in July, still only 19, midfielder Lucas has made 38 appearances in all competitions this season…
Erik “If I look back 30 years, there is one player who has gone from the Swedish league straight into the Premier League and made an impact, and that’s Freddie Ljungberg. Normally speaking, every Swedish player needs to take another step, maybe going to the Championship, maybe another league in another country, to get used to the bigger stage, a higher tempo, all those types of things, but Lucas has adapted phenomenally well. I thought he might even need to go on loan for a period to adapt to the English game, but he’s taken his opportunity. He’s growing physically and he loves the physical side of the game. Lucas reminds me a little of a young Michael Carrick, who I played with that season at Spurs in 2004/05. What a player, played off both feet, never lost the ball, always evaded pressure. Lucas is an intelligent footballer. He’s adapted from Sweden to the Premier League, absorbed all the information, and that’s the sign of a talented player, technically and mentally. In Sweden, we’ve been looking for a top-class midfielder. We’ve had great strikers like Zlatan (Ibrahimovic), Henrik (Larsson), those guys, now we have Kulusevski, Isak, Gyökeres, but we’ve been lacking a top-class, holding midfielder. I don’t know if fans will remember a midfielder called Jonas Thern, he had some really great years at Benfica, Napoli, Roma, that calibre of player. Maybe, in a year or two, he could be at that level. It will be interesting when Spurs play Eintracht Frankfurt – they have a player called Hugo Larsson, another young Swedish player, two years older than Lucas, they are probably fighting for the same spot in the Swedish national team at the moment (Larsson withdrew from the latest squad for the friendlies against Luxemboug and Northern Ireland in this international break). It will be interesting to see how that develops, but I have to say, Lucas looks the real deal.”