In total, Carlos Tevez faced Tottenham Hotspur 15 times whilst he was playing in England, scoring against Spurs only three times.
Tevez had an excellent record in England with West Ham United and Manchester United and Manchester City, but he evidently never enjoyed too much success against Tottenham.
In fact, after losing to Spurs 3-0 with Manchester City in 2009 at White Hart Lane, Tevez came away from the game seriously impressed with one member of Spurs’ back line, Michael Dawson.
Later on in the season in 2010, Tevez reflected on playing against Dawson in that defeat and labelled the defender as ‘very strong’.
Dawson was playing in a back four that also contained Benoit Assou-Ekotto, Sebastien Bassong and Vedran Corluka – but it was the Englishman who stood out.
Carlos Tevez couldn’t believe that Michael Dawson didn’t play more often for England
Speaking about his match up with Dawson in 2010, Tevez actually seemed perplexed that the defender didn’t play more often for England.
Tevez said: “We lost 3-0 and he didn’t let me into the game.
“I know he doesn’t play for England, but he is the best English defender I have played against – very strong.”
In total, before retiring in 2021, Dawson only earned a total of four caps for his country, which did actually come at around that time.
The Tottenham defender, who eventually joined Hull City for £3.5m in 2014, earned his caps under Fabio Capello and predominantly played alongside Chelsea’s John Terry in England’s defence.
Michael Dawson named the best strikers he ever faced
Speaking to the Guardian a few years after Tevez’s comments, Dawson was asked about those words and was in turn told to name the best strikers he’d ever had to deal with.
Dawson named the best defender in Premier League history recently, but in terms of the best striker he had faced, the former Spurs captain found it a little harder.
He said: “That’s very high praise from a top player like Carlos; when you play against him you never get a minute’s rest because he’s in around you all the time.
“I think it would be unfair of me to name any one player in the Premier League as a particularly difficult opponent, because there’s so many quality strikers.
“Ade [Emmanuel Adebayor] used to cause us all sorts of problems when he played for Arsenal, the likes of Wayne Rooney … Didier Drogba … I’ve played against JD [Jermain Defoe] before and he’s top-class … I played against Louis Saha last night and he’s another top player.
“When you’re playing against these guys week in and week out, you’ve got to be on top of your game all the time.”
A formidable list of players, but one that Tevez didn’t quite make it on himself.
