Cristian Romero was forced to come off at half-time during Tottenham's 2-2 draw with Manchester City on Sunday, with Thomas Frank's side already down to the bare bones
Tottenham captain Cristian Romero has brandished his side's lack of squad depth a 'disgrace' after becoming their latest absentee. Romero, 27, was subbed off at half-time as Spurs dramatically came from behind to draw 2-2 at home to Manchester City on Sunday.
The Argentine defender had been suffering from illness for a few days and couldn't continue. Instead of subbing him for a like-for-like replacement, manager Thomas Frank brought on midfielder Pape Matar Sarr for the second half and rejigged his setup.
Frank only had one recognised centre-back on the bench, 17-year-old Junai Byfield. Although Spurs earned a valuable point, Romero was left unhappy with their lack of options and has taken aim at the club's hierarchy for the second time in the space of a month.
In a fiery social media post, which he shared just 43 minutes after the transfer window closed on Monday, the centre-back wrote: "Great effort from all my teammates yesterday, they were incredible. I wanted to be available to help them even though I wasn't feeling well, especially since we only had 11 players available - unbelievable but true and disgraceful.
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"We'll keep showing up and taking responsibility to turn this around, working hard and staying together. All that's left is to thank all of you for being there and for always supporting us, the fans."
Tottenham only signed one player on deadline day, welcoming Hearts striker James Wilson on loan. Spurs have a lengthy injury list which includes Pedro Porro, Micky van de Ven, Ben Davies, Rodrigo Bentancur, Lucas Bergvall, James Maddison, Mohammed Kudus, Dejan Kulusevski and Richarlison.
Romero's outburst comes less than four weeks after he controversially hit out at his bosses in the wake of Tottenham's 3-2 loss away to Bournemouth. Taking to Instagram once more, the Argentina international claimed that 'other people' should be coming out to speak publicly, and added that they 'only show up when things are going well, to tell a few lies'.
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Romero, who later edited his post, went on to say: "At times like this, it should be other people coming out to speak, but they don't - as has been happening for several years now. They only show up when things are going well.
"We'll stay here, working, sticking together and giving our all to turn things around. Especially at times like this, keeping quiet, working harder and moving forward all together, is part of football."
Frank and Tottenham's co-sporting director, Johan Lange, spoke with Romero about the post. The Spurs boss went on to confirm that Romero wouldn't be stripped of the captaincy nor would he be fined. "He is our captain, he's not been fined," Frank stated.
"That's an internal thing, but we haven't done that. I think there's a lot of ways to deal with different situations. We've chose to have a good conversation with him, understand where he stands, handle it internally and that's everything I have to say."