Are Spurs moving on from Maddison?

The dart celebration. The beaming smile. The silky football that characterised the start of 2023-24 at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.

This time last year it would have seemed barely believable that people might be questioning James Maddison's place in Ange Postecoglou's side.

But after his half-time substitution for (defensive?) midfielder Pape Sarr launched an enterprising second-half display to thrash West Ham on Saturday, the vice captain's status as an automatic starter has to be up for debate.

Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Maddison has still started all of Spurs' Premier League games this season and, while he had been subbed off in all of them, before Saturday the earliest he had left the field was the 77th minute.

In 40 appearances for Tottenham, he has 19 goal contributions - essentially one every other game - with six goals and 13 assists.

The previous time Maddison was withdrawn after 45 minutes for Tottenham was that seminal game against Chelsea last November, when Postecoglou's outstanding start to life in north London hit a significant bump in the road.

He subsequently missed 10 games and, as Spurs' campaign spluttered, he never quite rediscovered his early-season razzamatazz.

It could be argued he still has not, albeit two goals and three assists in eight games this season is totally in keeping with his record.

Indeed, he remains Tottenham's metronome, having had more touches (561) than all but the defensive trio of Cristian Romero, Pedro Porro and Micky van de Ven, averaging two shots per game and only ranking second for dribbles behind Dejan Kulusevkski (22 to 29).

As the graphic above shows, very little has changed.

Last season, Maddison averaged 48 passes per game - so far this year, it is 49. In 2023-24, he averaged 67 touches per game - in 2024-25, it is 70. Shooting-wise, he has dropped from 2.0 shots per game to 1.88.

Different games beget different tactics - and Saturday's tweak made a tremendous difference for Tottenham.

But before we even think about writing Maddison off, we need far more evidence.