Jose Mourinho has called on Tammy Abraham to explain the reasons behind his goal drought at Roma.
The England international, who is hoping to be part of Gareth Southgate's World Cup squad, has been firing blanks for several weeks. Last term Abraham, who was a marquee signing at the Stadio Olympico, was prolific - notching 27 goals - but he's been unable to back-up that form this season.
Abraham's last goal came in a win over Empoli back in September but he again failed to find the net at the weekend as Roma lost their derby clash against Lazio. The former Chelsea man has netted just three times this term with his struggles summed up by a open goal miss in a recent game against Verona.
Mourinho was quizzed on his striker's poor form but deflected attention towards the player. "You should ask him what’s the problem. If he is distracted, if he has a problem or if he thinks about the World Cup," the Roma boss told reporters.
He also issued a damning assessment of his side's attacking quality. “It’s not just the goals that we are lacking, but also playing as a team and winning individual duels around the pitch. When you play in a very direct fashion, you need to win the individual duels, and we didn’t do that today," he said.
Abraham scoring feats last term put himself firmly on Southgate's radar with his most recent cap coming in the goalless draw against Italy in June. His difficulties could not have come at a worse time however with the 25-year-old set to miss out on World Cup selection. The forward himself confessed last year that Mourinho was pushing him to produce more with the World Cup in mind.
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"Jose has told me just to be a monster. I think one of the things he said was that I was too much of a nice player and that you have to show that aggressiveness as a striker as you’re getting older," he said.
"It’s not always about being nice on the pitch. You need that character, you need that presence to frighten defenders and I think that’s something I’m learning and getting better at. Of course, the World Cup was in the back of my mind but really I just wanted to play football."
Southgate was in the stands for Roma's 4-0 defeat at the hands of Udinese back in September as he assessed Abraham in the flesh. There is still plenty of competition to be Harry Kane's understudy for the World Cup with Marcus Rashford, Ivan Toney and Callum Wilson all options ahead of the final squad announcement.
