Benoit Assou-Ekotto tells the truth; it'll be taken the wrong way

Benoit Assou-Ekotto is awesome. Whenever someone puts a microphone in front of him, he's honest and says what he's thinking. Everyone loves him for this. Yesterday, someone asked him whether or not he thinks Kyle Naughton is threatening his first team place. Benny told the truth. Here's the money quote, from The Guardian.

"He's not a real left-back and I don't think he has the same left foot as me, so I'm not worried about that," Assou-Ekotto said. "I'm not worried because obviously I can do stuff with my left foot that he can't do."

This is, of course, the truth. Kyle Naughton is a right back and he's pretty right-footed. He has decent positional awareness at left back and doesn't embarrass himself while crossing or passing with his left foot, but he's not left-footed and it shows. Assou-Ekotto has technical quality with his left foot that Naughton simply doesn't have. There's nothing controversial about this statement, and knowing Benny's personality like we do, we know that he was simply stating a fact about one facet of his game and not trashing a teammate.

But, you're going to see "ASSOU-EKOTTO TRASHES TEAMMATE" headlines all over the place for the next two days, so enjoy those!