This week Tottenham Hotspur manager Antonio Conte provided his thoughts on how the north London club handled their business during the January transfer window. The Italian tactician didn’t hide his opinion, saying he felt the squad had weakened.
Conte went on to say that four players that were part of his rotation left last month and the Premier League club only brought in two to replace them. At his press conference, he spoke with the media to clarify his remarks to Sky Sports Italy.
The Spurs manager didn’t hide from his remarks or didn’t walk them back. Instead, Conte doubled down by saying his squad went into January with a number of players and exited with two fewer players, which he feels weakens the team.
“We lost four players, and I said important players for Tottenham. Because these players that we sent away on loan, Tottenham paid a lot of money. When you spend a lot of money, it means we are talking about important players for the club,” Conte said, per Sky Sports.
“If I had 20 players and now I have 18 players numerically, you can be a bit weaker. Numerically. Then I said also with Kulusevski and Rodrigo Bentancur, as a squad, we are more complete. I think I was very, very clear.”
The actual test of whether Tottenham can build a squad that can compete for trophies will come in a few months. Whether Spurs finish in the top four or not, they’ll need to invest heavily to fix the squad and have it up to Conte’s standards.
That would be negative enough!
I let the football do the talking….
The media are desperate in trying to find something negative and contentious to make a story, so annoying.
Conte is of course right. Less numbers is a handicap but correcting an unbalanced team will take a while. I think so long as Spurs Board acknowledge it is time to change the policy of buy young looking for capital generation to invest in experience for income generation we have a platform to compete. I am holding my breath.