Tottenham defender Pedro Porro has hit back at Tim Sherwood following the pundit’s brutal criticism of his Spurs debut and has vowed to ‘keep his mouth shut’.
The Spaniard joined from Sporting on deadline day in January in a £40 million deal, although Emerson Royal’s superb form initially saw his playing time limited and he made a disastrous debut against Leicester city in which the team scored four goals.
However, he started as an assist in the last three Premier League matches Harry Kane against Nottingham Forest – his eighth assist of the season including his time at Sporting – as he scored his first goal for the club with a powerful finish against Southampton.
Porro’s performances in recent weeks even earned him a call-up to the Spanish national team, which seemed an unlikely prospect when Sherwood taunted him on his Spurs debut.
The former Tottenham Hotspur coach was on Sky Sports’ Soccer Saturday show when he described the 23-year-old fullback as ‘so bad it’s unbelievable’ and yelled for him to be knocked out.
But Porro has now spoken out about Sherwood over his comments, claiming it was ridiculous to expect him to settle in and perform right away, and is confident he’ll let the pundit eat his words.
When asked about Sherwood’s comments, Porro recounted The protector: ‘It doesn’t exactly irritate me. You know people are going to have their opinions, they’re going to say you played badly, you’re no good or whatever.
You try not to notice, but it’s impossible. There’s always someone who says, “Did you see this?”
“You read what is said about a player being at the club for two days – two days – and it hits you because you think, ‘I just got here!’
“I’m not a machine that goes like that and that’s it, I know everyone, I’m integrated. I really hope he keeps saying bad things about me that will make me stronger.
‘But it’s true that it made an impression because I was in a big club for such a short time and well… Let me loose in a prison and eventually I will own the club. But it’s hard: it was only a week, I had never played a minute at City, never played in England in my life.
“In a few days I will start against Leicester. What do you want? For me to score five and cut out 70 balls?!
“Anyone can have a bad day. From there I just keep going: taking English lessons, joining the group, adapting.’
Informed that Sherwood was not pulling trees up during his playing days at Tottenham, Porro continued: “It makes no difference to me. I do not know him. I don’t know what happened before he could talk.
“People passed it on and said he spoke badly of me. But he won’t be the first to shut up then.’
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