Tottenham had not scored in three Premier League games this season, yet the club left the player with its highest career goal tally out of the squad for the first half of the campaign. Something about that sits badly, whatever you think of Richarlison as a footballer.
De Zerbi is building around highly technical players, and Richarlison – all energy and elbows, short on finesse – never fit that picture. Moving on makes football sense. But the way it has been done, with the forward frozen out and some supporters piling on over the collapsed Ndiaye deal, is harder to defend. He deserved a cleaner ending than this.
The numbers make the case for him
Richarlison was Tottenham’s top Premier League scorer last season with 11 goals, and without them Spurs would likely have gone down – they survived by two points. He scored in draws with Brighton, Manchester United and Liverpool, and grabbed the decisive second in the 2-1 win over Aston Villa in May.
He also started both legs of the Europa League semi-final in 2024-25 and kept his place for the final win over Manchester United in Bilbao, ahead of then-captain Son Heung-min. That is not squad-filler form.
| Player group | PL goals | Appearances | Goals-per-game rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Richarlison (top flight, career) | 75 | 276 | 1 every 3.68 games |
| Solanke, Marmoush, Savio, Odobert, Kudus, Mudryk (combined) | 77 | 481 | 1 every ~6 games |
With Everton talks collapsing over personal terms and Trabzonspor having two bids rejected, his exit routes have all but disappeared, leaving a return to Brazil as the only realistic escape. According to The Athletic, he is now considering legal action to force a contract termination.
A £60m buy, but still a person
None of this erases the reality that a £60million ($81.2m) signing who struggled to hold up the ball or get shots away against Brentford is a legitimate footballing gamble to move on from. De Zerbi wants full commitment, and with Maddison and Kulusevski expected to return after injury absences, he clearly believes he has cover.
Except Xavi Simons – out until the new year with an ACL injury – made the registered squad and Richarlison did not. That looks less like a sporting decision than pressure, and it leaves Tottenham thin up front in a squad that still cannot find the net.
The verdict
Tottenham can walk away from Richarlison. What they should not get to do is walk away clean. If he is still around come January, this exclusion could start to look less like squad management and more like a self-inflicted wound – a desperate winter sale or a free transfer next summer for a player who helped keep this club in the Premier League. Moving on makes sense. This is still a sad, shabby way to do it.
