After much backslapping and praise from many supporters and much of the football press, Tottenham’s transfer activity appears to be slipping from energized activity into a mid-afternoon snooze.
The Sun among many believes that the next man aboard Antonio Conte’s alleged rebuild is Ruslan Malinovskyi, an attacking midfielder who has been plying his trade for the last three seasons for Italy’s Atalanta.
Conte needs an AMF, so what’s the problem with this one?
In a nutshell, the Ukrainian is 29 years of age and has become the second choice for the Serie A side, mopping up the minutes afforded him by Gian Piero Gasperini.
Another indicator should be the price. For a club that has blown so much on infrastructure, that tells us that securing European football allows us to attract better players, why are we linked with €18 million rated seniors of this calibre?
I believe that the right answer to Spurs’ attacking midfield conundrum is obviously Leicester City’s James Maddison, but then what do I know?
We are huge.. The tallest team in the league!
Hello mum.
Wow. Levy really doesn’t give a damn about the team. Very interesting stat.
Although in fairness he is good in the air. I’m at the ‘anyone but Royal’ stage now.
LOL your photo? wtf man
When our new signings came on and we switched formation.. Then we did go toe to toe.. We snatched an away point in the 96th minute.
Under Paratici and Conte the signings have been good so far… Champions League standard now. And we’re only going to get better.
Perisic and Bissouma will be first choice… Conte is a master at building squads fast. He hasn’t started them yet because he doesn’t want to upset the balance.. And the lads starting so far had earned their places.. Hopefully both will be integrated against wolves.
Maureens timing all round was unfortunate.. He joined when Covid hit making his job far more difficult.. It was shocking he didn’t get to play that league cup final.. At that time Pep had won 27 out of 28 finals, the one man to beat him was Maureen.. And Levy sacks him 5 days before.. Absolutely shocking.
We don’t know exactly what happened between Conte and the Chavski….. What we do know is that there were problems between them.. The Chavs sacked him claiming ‘his behaviour breached the terms of his contract’..
Conte then sued them successfully for wrongful sacking…
If you look at all of Contes signings across all of his clubs then you see that he has an average spend only a little more than Botchettino… Yes of course he signed some duds along the way, but at every club he builds winning squads, and fast.
Fair points man.
Fair point.
An organised campaign? 🤔
So, we don’t have the right midfielders in that case.
Not for me, 40m tops.
No it isn’t daft at all. Take your rose tinted specs off and see the level of quality required to complete for honours compared to ours…
Wouldn’t say Kulu was upfront ..also flexible formations seem to be the way forward CFC ..varied the numbers in their midfield and back line during the game last Sunday..we have a long way to go.
You lost me at “as always”
Kante and Jorginho or PEH and Bentancur? I rest my case me lud….
Gotta walk it like ya talk it Daniel! 😂
Good thing Romero is on that side 🙂
that you Pickjles?
lol
Puts in a few decent defensive displays, Easty, but just like Dier, Winks, Lamela, Dele et al, he’s part of the crew that stagnated under Poch. Been here too long, is too comfortable, no flair or aggression. Ive no doubt he’s Tottenham, but needs to move on. We need to move on.
There has been no tangible proof that Moura could do a job at RWB. He is awfully small for the defensive duties required.
Definitely not Spurs
These 2 are decent, but they hardly stood out in Serie A and were part of the January window. They have made Spurs better, but this transfer window has not set the world alight. The squad has been improved but the First XI, as highlighted in the Chelsea game, is still lacking in a lot of areas. If you are genuinely happy with that, then you are misreading 23 years of absolute nonsense from ENIC. I don’t just want to beat Southampton 4-1, I want to go toe to toe with Chelsea (like the Battle of the Bridge) and not look mediocre. Since that day Levy has spent money, but the recruitment has been pitiful.
And while I’m at it, a few days ago you remarked about Havertz jumping up and shouting at the referee afyer I wrote about Romero. This was from a Bentancur challenge. I was writing about a Romero tackle on Havertz in the second half on the other side of the pitch, toward the corner,where the tackle was fair, but Romero went through Havertz and did hurt him.
“Someone said yesterday that `Bentancur is the best overal midfielder at the club’, as if it meant he was indispensable. Compared to who? PEH, Winks, Skipp? Big deal…”
That was me.
I actually like PEH, Bentancur and Skipp. I think they all have redeeming qualities. When played in a 3 v 2 situation it is always difficult. Conte prefers to play the extra man further forward.
Me too. I’ve always felt that Davies and Dier were capable of making valid contributions despite the mistakes.
The frustration that saw off Poch, Jose and Nuno was often vented at these players. Sometimes they deserved it but I doubt the lack of support helped their cause.
Davies and Dier are part of the furniture. Good enough to be in the squad. I also agree regarding the LCB position being made for Davies. It best suits the attributes he has.
It’s the system though isn’t it? It’s effectively two men in central midfield so when they are up against three or more it becomes difficult. When Winks was one of the two it became impossible.
It’s the price we pay for playing 3 up top.
Satire at it’s finest G man. I think you may be evicted though. For what it is worth I hope not. Made me laugh.
So far ..certainly instigated change in pace and attitude v CFC..suspended for Soton game ..It’s all up in the air..I can feel a quiz show coming on.
I’m getting a whiff of Highbury about the place.
Kuslevski/Bentancur ?
Some clowns on here….
I think we want Madison and Leicester are almost a plausible destination for Harry Winks. Levy will not want a cash only deal for Madison or an auction involving Newcastle that’s for sure. Not with Leicester’s valuation. Madison will want to play with Kane and Son at Spurs so I think it is safe to assume that the stink around this deal is probably Levy’s skidmarked pants.
On a separate matter; I understand there is a new chant doing the rounds. I recently heard some United supporters being taunted with; “always look on the bright side of life”. United obviously adopted this when they were on the up in the early 90’s.
After the ironic rendition was sung back to the United supporters it was followed up by;
“Always look out for Giggs sha55ing your wife” to the same tune.
Nice to see that terrace humour is still alive and kicking.
Agree cabs, but as soon as we went to 433 they scored easily with Davies trying to defend 2 men. I reckon Conte decided it’s a lesser evil to get destroyed in midfield than at the back. We just need more quality, but we’re getting there…
And No Offence, but P L says “An understudy to Kulusevski”
At 29 years old an understudy??? 🤣🤣🤣
Thus far we seem to be getting Conte the guys he wants. Maybe Zaniolo doesn’t want to leave the more friendly Serie A? I have no problem so far, we stll need a few more/better players but it takes time to get the right players, especially if they’re not available.
Been reading the hype and been eagerly awaiting the Harry ‘Stato’ Hotspur treatment. I had a look myself at his passing accuracy stats (77% in 21/22). Exceptional passing accuracy is necessary, surely? Here are some comparisons with other Premier League midfielders:
Højbjerg: 90%
Bentancur: 90%
Skipp: 90%
B. Silva: 90%
Bissouma: 89%
Grealish: 88%
Foden: 87%
Smith Rowe: 87%
Mount: 85%
De Bruyne: 83%
Maddison: 81%
Malinovskyi: 77% 💩
Hello
First issue is ensuring we win the games we should. Plenty of points to get there.
Seem to remember half of Contes meltdown at Chelsea was that he didn’t Giroud? Could this have legs, well he’s obviously saved them.
😂, not that funny though.
I thought the biggest problem against Chelsea was our formation though we were out numbered in midfield and our 3 best players weren’t involved at all . The chavs worked this out after 10 mins and gleefully all bombed forward with their tales up. Conte should have changed it much sooner.
It’s when the defence comes under sustained pressure that you see how good the defence is. The one or two touch football of CFC undid our defence though some blame needs to be shouldered by the midfield who offered scant protection ..where was our glue..we were undone ..
Davies isn’t the worst he is an honest player who does his best but sadly we have too many like this in our back line which makes it easy to unpick for better sides.
Once again your train of thought has veered off track.
Fans didnt moan about these signings everything I have seen or heard says they are in shock that the club has done as Conte demanded (i.e. early).
We who arent involved in lapping up Enic’s juice remember 21 other seasons where various managers have spouted the “we do things differently at Spurs”.
The problem is we have just been schooled at Racist FC once again and did scrabble a draw but very little glory so where does that leave us.
Will we ever be able to attract top shelf players instead of squad fillers that the soon to be Googled Danny Rose still needs to Google? The Deloitte Report that came out in the last week showed that we still have the 6th highest wage bill in the EPL, behind the usual City, Liverpool, Utd, Chelsea and Arsenal. City pay £150m a year more out in wages than us, Arsenal £50m. Leicester are not far away in 7th place but their bubble looks like it has burst, but at least they have had 2 trophies to show for it! Despite our revenue increasing due to all the marketing streams that Levy is rightly exploiting the other teams are doing this as well, so we are in limbo or purgatory, which appears more apt.
We cannot compete with the European trophy brigade (Real, Barca, Bayern, PSG) for players and the English teams, soon to be joined by Newcastle means unless we make a concerted push to change the dynamic of how we go about our business nothing will change. Even with Utd and Arsenal having a downturn in success, they have still won cups when we have fallen short. The English Cups are so damn hard to win, look at Liverpool. They have had one of the best teams in English history yet have one League, FA Cup and League Cup to show for it. Gone are the days when the League Cup was a second rate trophy and Luton and Oxford were competing for it, if you win this Cup, a team has definitely earned it because Chelsea, City and Liverpool (3 of Europe’s elite clubs) go all out for it. The Quadruple is the new Treble! I remember when the Double was nigh on impossible.
The Deloitte report shows in 2021 we were bringing in more money than Arsenal (£35m), but we are still a fair chunk behind Chelsea for 2021 (about £75m), so the only way we can bridge that next gap is to win trophies, no? That way we would increase the Tottenham brand globally, get more supporters willing to buy crap merch and tv rights for our games. The stadium is obviously going to help, but we will need to fill it every week, and will it actually help catch the teams above us, really?
I don’t want to sign Ukrainians who are Serie A cast offs, but who else are we going to buy? We talk about good transfer windows but we always fall short in getting that one player who might truly make us sit on the edge of our seats in hope something spectacular might happen. Instead, we get decent players but none the ‘big boys’ will touch. As an experience we can offer the ‘tourist fan’ a great day out in the nation’s capital finishing off in the shop (We are a Sporty Warner Brothers Tour), but for a Spurs fan, over a season, we can offer a rollercoaster ride and the tantalising chance to win a trophy, which will actually be won by City, Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal or Utd, because they spend more on their players than we do.
This is the thing..I was hoping either the graft of PEH would allow Bentancour to be be more creative or vice versa..but neither happened v CFC they passed the ball around us choked Kane and we looked dumbfounded until Charlie came on ..with verve and enterprise..pushing CfC back a little..this is what we need in our midfield.
as always no offence intended but this chat is a roll call,of stupidity and misery.
to the geezer who said we’re only linked to Italian league players. That’s 1 of 7 summer signings you’re talking about. And the ones we got in Jan weren’t too shabby were they???
to the muppet who said conte has to prove himself not to be another Jose…WTF.? Antonioooooooo took a shit tip demoralised team to 4th and the promised land. Jose didn’t get close. We score goals for fun and are genuinely up for multiple trophies this season.
to everyone whose whinging about no world class signings. We’re building a world class squad ffs. Look at every teams “marquee signings” recently. Pogba, Grealish, Pepe, Ndombele, Sancho, Lukaku etc etc. how did they all fare?
fuck me how can you be moaning now? This is our brightest window in years.
all responses to a BS article about a player we don’t want to sign hahaha. It’s obviously been put in by an agent. Ofc we’re not competing with forest for a player dumbasses. No offence ……
odds are we sign zanoilo by end of window. And I’ll be in the south stand singing my heart out whilst you lot cry into your warm bitters.
milinkovic-savic is THE BEST all-round skilled midfielder at the moment, i was surprised that no club was connected to him this summer
Could also really use a quality CB right now. The possibility of Romero or Dier getting injured is scary. And I also really don’t know why we’re not using Moura as first choice RWB atm.
Steve, I do know his history and his track record, but I also knew Mourhinos. Steve, I hope i’m proved wrong. COYS
spot on Slacky, proven at the highest level, top top player. Doesn’t fit with Conte’s rigid style, which sort of suggests our current wing back are going to create more for us than a Maddison would, never bought that approach fully.
I understand Malinovsyi’s contribution to the team in that he’s low cost, will give us wiggle-room in our formation and he won’t demand too much game time, but I think we should be think about getting our overall squad ready for the CL. The Chelsea match should have warned us that CL clubs are likely to run all over our midfield and I think we should be more focused on squad quality than depth right now as we’ve handled that department earlier in the window. I think the best player to help with this is Milenkovic Sergej Savic. He has the numbers, is younger and better than Malinovskyi and is versatile enough to play both in AM and CM, meaning he can replace either PEH and Bentancur. And while we may be sentimental seeing those two relegated to the bench behind Bissouma and Savic, I believe it’s all for the better seeing the danger of using our current midfield options in the CL. Maddison is probably too good to be on the bench most of the time, and I’m not a fan of his attitude either. But Savic spells intent and backing the manager, and ticks soo many boxes
Steve, have a look at all the signings Conte made at Chelsea and sales too. It’s not a nailed on successful list, I saw it published somewhere and didn’t look good for Conte.
I suspect this is another Lenglet type deal, if in fact we are genuinely interested in the boy. In other words, like Bastoni, our top choice, Zaniolo, is unavailable (at least at any price or under any condition that makes any sense), accordingly we’re going for a cheaper option, that fulfils the same function.
I am not saying those two scenarios are equivocal, as Lenglet was no risk, just a loan and only recently turned 27, whereas this boy comes with a price tag, circa 15 million pounds and is 29. Nevertheless Paratici’s track record so far from Serie ‘A’ has been excellent, so maybe this boy is a genuine diamond in the rough? Then again maybe he’s a cheap punt!
Haha, true 😅
totally agree Mike, look at the signings other clubs have made and most have bought players who have started and made an instant impact. Chelsea and Arsenal good 9bad) examples. We have improved squad depth, but not first team IMO. Maddison is the one for me, but will Conte be able to adapt his rigid one way of playing?
Another class CB will help us more than a run of the mill AM
I didn’t write that…
Yes man. Savic all day…. Maddison is too lightweight.
Leicester wont budge on £60M, and the lad is in talks over a new contract. This one’s a dead duck.
Could have got Maddison for £9,000,000 when he was at Coventry. Tottenham do an awful lot of window shopping, but as the song says, Never stopping to buy. COYS
Paratici is an expert from Italy. He worked there for a decade plus so knows the league, clubs and players.
Conte is also Italian.. Of course he’s as good as everyone ‘makes him out to be’.. Just look at his track record if you don’t know his history.
If we were a smaller side, there are other options. But allegedly we’re huge!
A campaign began after Marb’s piece on Sess. Very weird behaviour.
That is daft… who are we gonna buy that is better than Son, Kane or Kulu? And if we do which of the aforementioned three will be happy to be benched? We need squad depth in attack like Richarlison, a good player who can rotate with the main three when required without a massive drop off in quality you had Last season with Moura and Bergwjin, and can also offer something different in games we are struggling in
Richie £60,000,000?? Money well spent?
Does it matter who he is back up for? As long as he is an option to back them up. He could fill in for Kulu or Son if required. Also allows us to transition into a 3-5-2 when required. Just because he adds different skills does mean he is better than our starters, just gives us a different option when needed. It’s a signing we need in my opinion, not Necessarily this player, but a similar type of player
People are raving about the business Conte and co have done so far in this window, I am Not one of those. Why are all the players that we are either looking at or have purchased, are from the Italian league???? Is the Tottenham spotter? scout? and negotiator? on very good salaries, good bonuses or just being Very well paid by Tottenham, or getting back handers from the selling clubs? We keep hearing that Conte loves this player and has told Paratici to get the deal done. All summer I have noted that Tottenham have been Linked with 47 players? Why do we keep pushing to sign Zaniolo, when he clearly doesn’t want to sign, Move on an go for quality players that want to come and play for the club. We seem to be paying Top dollar for the players that we have bought and getting buttons for the players we have sold, Some negotiators we have. Go for Paqueta and Maddison, forget this guy Malinovskyi, close the cheque book unless a British born, quality player becomes available. Not convinced that Conte is as good as he’s made out to be, would love to be proven wrong, if he succeeds in delivering a trophy or 2. COYS.
Any player that doesn’t improve our first 11 should not be entertained, it’s that simple…
It’s not just about squad depth.
The game against Chavs highlighted how much we are wanting in midfield, bringing in yet another player that doesn’t improve the first 11 is utterly pointless. You create depth by bringing in quality that displaces the players that aren’t as good and they have to fight their way back in or become part of rotation and/or sold.
This is a competitive arena, lots of mediocre depth behind a mediocre first team is, you guessed it; still mediocre…
That fella from Lazio might be useful but I doubt we’ll be getting him…
Doesn’t really matter, he’s not good enough to improve us to any degree…
He really needed to disappear for a bit, it was becoming nauseating. Cheers!
Maddison is the ONLY creative / attacking midfielder we ought to be trying to recruit, IF we want to really be ambitious.
Filling with mediocrity? Not sure what your agenda is but your position is a bit weird, you generally come across as you might work on behalf of ENIC…
It’s about squad depth. James maddison would be ideal, but he is not guaranteed to start and i cannot see him liking that. Though I am just guessing.This Malinovski is a good option for squad depth and offers somethings we don’t have in our squad, and is experienced/proven at a high level, I cannot see the issue.
Couple of issues with your reasoning there… if he’s not coming in as a starter, then WHO is he a backup for? Which AMF is he complementing? And if you’re saying that he’s coming to cover all those things “we lack”, then WHY wouldn’t he be starting?!
To me, it’s hugely underwhelming and signing a player for the sake of signing a player!
“… would require Uncle Joe to sell an island or two.” … no, just a Hockney or two (from the walls of his yacht!)
Someone said yesterday that `Bentancur is the best overal midfielder at the club’, as if it meant he was indispensable. Compared to who? PEH, Winks, Skipp? Big deal…
Haha good, thought as much
More mediocrity is what it is…
I think Davies is a decent and experienced part of the squad, it’s the general lack of quality overall that concerns me…
I remember Davies signing a new deal along with Sissoko about three years ago, Poch with a long face just said, “this is the decision of the club”…
I had to Google every single one, apart from ‘Richie’. Who I knew about, because he nearly got relegated last season…
The first 11 still needs fixing ..that’s the truth about the window, there is still time granted ..but watching how easily CFC over ran our midfield and turned our defence into strangers was disturbing , Chelsea will not be the only team to try this ..we simply do not have the attacking ability in our midfield to stop the high press…
Exactly.
I cannot see why his minutes played is an issue as he would not be coming as a starter, he would come in to compliment/rotate with what we already have, much like richarlison. Let’s be honest his stats, G/A, in the last few seasons despite not being a guaranteed starter are very good, not quite maddison, but better than Zaniolo, and he can score from distance, something we lack, takes set pieces, something we lack, and is a more natural style number 10, something we lack, and is proven over more than 1 season, unlike Zaniolo. So I see no issue other than its a smart deal rather than a mega money deal, which isn’t really a bad thing
Forest are supposed to be the other club interested in this player, is that what we do when we are trying to ‘go places’? Unless all this ‘positivity’ is backed up with actions then what exactly does ‘going places’ mean? Where are we heading, what are we supposed to be aiming for?
Because outside of finishing in the top four it seems Levy is generally unwilling and uninterested in to step things up. He’ll be thinking “what’s the minimum we can spend net and still finish top 4? We are getting into Ryan Nelson and Louis Saha territory here.
I reckon Levy’s done. Spence is the completion for Royal, Bissouma is all we’re getting in midfield and Lenglet is the defender. Why will he spend money if he thinks Champions League qualification is likely with what we have?
Oh, and he has the perfect excuse of the financial ‘log-jam’ caused by Wobblybelly and Gio. Both of which is entirely a situation of his own making…
Twat
Hahahaha
Attacking Midfielder is the spot that needs filling someone who can play straight away..not another punt to provide cover , that makes us look busy , Maddison should get us CL quarters..providing our defence doesn’t fall apart if any opposition has the temerity to high press in our last third. It’s the first 11 that needs fixing ..
⬆️ This.
Very funny! But Levy’s actions have left HH feeling cold and it’s August.. tells you all you need to know about Daniel Levy.
None of these players were recommended on this blog so they will all fail? I can only hope this is some poor form of humour.
We let Eriksen go to ManU and we don’t want Maddison..proven in this league ..utter nonsense we will not pay for the quality required.
*19/20
He hasn’t got 5003 career minutes, he has 5003 Serie A minutes – he’s only been there since 19/30. He has 20,830 career minutes.
Harry not really becoming for someone your age to be ageist. 😜😂
Cannot change his habits ..if carpets were in vogue Levy would bring in mats ..for the people that don’t want carpets..being so far ahead of the curve is a danger to one’s anus.