Thursday 6 October 2016 10:12, UK
England's Kyle Walker says Tottenham team-mate Dele Alli needs to "keep it simple" in what is a big season for the midfielder.
Alli followed in the footsteps of Walker in winning the PFA Young Player of the Year award at the end of the 2015-16 campaign, and the pair were both selected for England's squad for Euro 2016, where the national side crashed out against Iceland in the first knockout round.
After a disappointing end to a successful season on a personal level, in which Alli scored 10 Premier League goals, Walker believes the current campaign will prove just how good Alli is.
"It's vital," Walker said ahead of England's World Cup qualifier against Malta on Saturday. "I can remember when I got the Young Player of the Year, to follow it on the next season makes you a very good player or a very average player.
"He's doing it tremendously well. From a young age, the weight on his shoulders, he deals with it in his stride.
"I always say he looks like he's playing in the park. It's fantastic to see someone just playing football with a smile on their face and enjoying every moment of it."
Alli has seen an upturn in form in Tottenham's recent fixtures, with Spurs the only remaining unbeaten team in the Premier League this season.
The 20-year-old has scored two top-flight goals already in the new campaign, but Walker had some words of advice for his young team-mate.
"He can express himself a little bit more, but I think he just needs to keep it simple sometimes, which the manager does tell him too," said Walker.
"When he does express himself in the final third you can't have a go at players for doing that, because more times than not it does come off. We do get a lot of goals from that.
"We're only human, we can't be 10 out of 10 each week. Dele does fantastically well for Tottenham.
"Everyone is going to do their homework on him, he's a threat so you're going to do your homework and try to stop him at source but Dele is an intelligent boy, he's streetwise. He does seem to get away from people in tight situations."
Danny Rose backed Tottenham manager Mauricio Pochettino to be an "amazing" England manager one day, and Walker admitted the club's strong presence within the current national set-up can have a positive impact in the next two games against Malta and Slovenia.
"The Spurs boys that are here, we try and stick together on the pitch and try and bring our game from Spurs into England," he added.
"Obviously the manger wants to play a certain way but I feel having a good core of players who have been at the Euros together has helped."
