Our Squad 2019/20 - and the Rebuild !

[Spursidol]

Edit - squad now updated assuming Wanyama is now staying and Parrott included in the CL squad.

October - edit for Vorm being re-signed

Gk’s - Lloris, Gazzaniga, Vorm
CB’s - Alderweireld, Vertonghen, Sanchez, Foyth (u21)
FB’s - Aurier, Walker Peters (Club), Rose (Club), Davies
CM’s - Ndombele, Winks (Club), Dier, Sissoko, Wanyama, Skipp (u21)
AM’s - Eriksen, Dele (Assn), Son, Moura, Lamela. Lo Celso, Sessegnon (Assn)
FWD’s – Kane (Club) Parrott

UEFA Player Designation Summary

Players are categorised by the UEFA designation of Club trained (Club) and Trained by other FA Affiliated Clubs (Assn) or Under 21 (u21), where there is no designation the player is Overseas Trained

Overseas Trained (maximum 17) : 18 (including Parrott and Vorm)
Club Trained : 4. (Kane, Winks, Walker-Peters, Rose)
Trained by other FA Affiliated Club : 2 ( Dele, Sessegnon )
U21’s – 2 (Foyth, Skipp, )
Total - 26 Players (including Vorm and Parrott)

Note - as Parrott has been with Spurs for less than 2 years he is not regarded as an u21' player but an Overseas Trained player. Next season he will revert to being an u21'. Same rule means that Sessegnon will be categorised as an Association Trained player and not an u,21. whilst taking advantage of that rule means Foyth is an u21' this season.

Vorm will be eligible for PL squad as Parrott will be considered an u21' (rather than overseas trained,) but will NOT be eligible for CL squad. However in January will have the opportunity to re-jig the CL squad and Mary include Vorm by either dropping Parrott out or another overseas trained player who is either sold or Poch decided will not play in the knock out stages ( eg. Aurier or Wanyama may be candidates)

The Rebuild

Key players tied down to at least 2022 - Kane, Ndombele, Son, Dele, Lloris, Sanchez, Lucas, Winks, Moura, Lo Celso (assuming the loan option is converted to permanent). That provides a strong core to rebuild round.

Goalkeepers
Not an essential area to make changes until say 2021 - Lloris has his weaknesses but we are unlikely to get a better goalkeeper.

Whiteman seems to be preferred candidate for 3rd GK - but we might want to see if there are more experienced but under utilised GK's to bring in , possibly as a long term successor to Lloris ?

Centre Backs
The only question is when we need to bring in replacements for the aging (and out of contract at end of this season) Vertonghen and Alderweireld. Good news is we have Sanchez and Foyth in place with the versatile Dier available and a very promising pre-season from Tanganga.

We might well bring in one or two experienced but young (lets say 22/23) CB in January or next summer to replace one or both of Jan and Toby.

Full Backs
Rose is almost certainly in his last season at Spurs - is Sessegnon his replacement or do we need to buy a LB ? A short term solution could be Harvey White (who played there very well in preseason) but is really a CM, and only 18 but an option none the less, and Dennis Cirkin (same age as White) has also looked good as LB in youth and a candidate to be in next seasons preseason squad. Davies is a good solid no 2.
RB is a question, as KWP may well be one of the long term options (this season will decide that), whilst Foyth might also settle into the role.

Think the transfer activity will be next summer unless a top candidate becomes available inJanuary

Centre Midfield
Ndombele, Winks and the ever improving Skipp seem to be here for the long term. We also have Sissoko and Dier who might either be here just for this season or longer, with Wanyama still here at least until January

We also have Harvey White who looked very good in pre-season (albeit playing in a secondary role at LB) and Jamie Bowden also played in preseason. If either of these play this season, its likely we will not buy but rely on Dier and Sissoko in the short term until either or both of White and Bowden come through. There is also Luke Amos on loan at QPR but excellent in pre-season 2018 who might claim a CM squad spot

With Lo Celso and Dele also able to drop back, we probably do not NEED to buy.

Attacking Midfield
Possibly the strongest lineup we have had for many years. Big elephant in the room is whether Eriksen stays or goes at the end of this season or even January ( unlikely) If he stays we have no need to bring someone else in, if he goes we are almost certainly in the market for another AM or versatile AM/striker.

One or two possibly coming through the youth system - Jack Roles probably being the best known. But he wont play this season, and might only be a bit part player next season. I think we may buy a versatile AM if Sessegnon looks to become a LB rather than a LM/LW, even if Eriksen stays.

Striker
Having a world class striker brings its problems. With Son and Moura we certainly have cover - but that might mean we need an extra AM ? But with Troy Parrott looking a great prospect, who wont make much impact in playing time this season, and possibly next season will be more like 10 starts and 10 off the bench its still only 50/50 that we buy another striker, and only if a good versatile striker turns up. Dybala, ok maybe.


Overall though the squad is in pretty good shape, with most of our key players tied into long term contracts. But the rebuild has started and will continue

And changes there will be :

January 2020 - Maybe one or two new players, as always availability is king in January
Summer 2020 - Maybe 4 - 6 players. Just depends on who is available

Thoughts ?

 

[SpiderSpurs]

Shocking that we are having to rebuild when in fact we should be evolving.

Here comes another 3-5 year plan...

 

[Park Lane Mark Twain]

Oliver Skipp - 18
Jack Clarke - 18
Ryan Sessegnon - 19
Troy Parrott - 17
Juan Foyth - 21
Tanguy Ndombele - 22
Kyle Walker-Peters - 22
Davinson Sanchez - 23
Dele Alli - 23
Giovani Lo Celso - 23
Harry Winks - 23

11 members of our squad who have every chance of making it at the top of the game, all still able to play for our youth/ development team in games. We also have impressive sounding talent in our youth set up in the form of Harvey White, Dennis Cirkin, Max Robson etc

Add one of our youth goalkeepers into it and we could actually see this team play in a 4-3-2-1 (GK, KWP, Sanchez, Foyth, Sessegnon, Skipp, Winks, Ndombele, Dele, Lo Celso, Parrott) Clarke wouldn't even make the starting XI!

That's an excellent looking spine for the manager to build around over the next 5-8 years, without even considering the guys like Lucas, Sonny, Kane, Dier etc who are still only mid 20s. The first cycle of moving the old guard on started with Dembele, next will be Jan, probably Toby & Eriksen but I doubt many teams in the PL have what must be about £300m+ worth of player they can throw into an U23 match if need be.

Decent long term planning right there, we just need a few to kick on a little more than they have done to date.

 

[Park Lane Mark Twain]

The players to take over from those at the end of their 'shelf life' should already be in place hence my use of the word evolving.

They are and have been for a while, it's just that some of them haven't progressed how we hoped they would.

Sanchez and Foyth are in their 3rd season with us now. Both were clearly signed to cover the ageing Jan & Toby but at present haven't done enough to convince like signings occasionally don't.

Ndombele is our Dembele replacement, no issues as it stands here.

Lo Celso will probably be someone who can fill in for Eriksen even if he's not a like for like. This is one area that I do think we have left ourselves short but then again, show me someone that fits the Eriksen mound in our team that we can replace him with? Not many of this kind of player about.

The issues still exist that existed when we had our best XI which to me was Lloris, Walker, Alderweireld, Vertonghen, Dier, Rose, Wanyama, Dembele, Eriksen, Dele & Kane. For a team like us, trying to find upgrades on any of those was near on impossible and the signings we have made thereafter have shown that to be true.

The sooner we all accept that Walker wanted out, Rose got a bit frumpy and not as sharp, the two Belgians got older, Dier & Wanyama in typical Spurs fashion got long term injuries at the same time, Dembele's legs went & Eriksen chose to stick to his career plan the better.

We say about evolution but name me any glaringly obvious players that have moved to a club, that are/ were obtainable that we missed out on that would have bettered that starting XI.

It's a tricky one and the club have tried to cut corners a little bit yes but every singing comes with risk and for me I think we had our core all come good all at once which is a rare thing in football. It's just a huge shame that they all have nothing to show for it.

Fascinating times on the evolution of the team. For me as it stands we need 3-4 more for the first team over the next 12 months or we do risk going backwards over relying on punts that seemingly haven't fulfilled their potential as of yet. A big year for Walker-Peters, Aurier if he stays (which I don't think he will personally), Sanchez, Foyth & Winks. All of them need to add to their game or they won't have a genuine long term future being starters at Spurs.

 

[Mandy]

We're only 2 games into the season so I really don't think we need to be worrying about a possible rebuild next year at this stage. We'll still have the same strong core in the squad and I expect there will be some youngsters stepping up over the season too.

I swear this forum has more drama queens than RADA! Why can't people just enjoy what we've got now and leave the worrying about next year until next year?!

 

[Swoos]

I’d like to say, I think the criticism towards Levy/Poch for the handling of RB is unfair. They sold Trippier who Poch clearly did not like as a player. And neither did the fans. His replacement was already on the squad. Foyth. His backup was going to be KWP. That was the plan. Unfortunately both players went down with injuries. Something Poch has no control over. Yet all I hear is people blaming him for not having a RB right now.

 

[bus-conductor]

I’d like to say, I think the criticism towards Levy/Poch for the handling of RB is unfair. They sold Trippier who Poch clearly did not like as a player. And neither did the fans. His replacement was already on the squad. Foyth. His backup was going to be KWP. That was the plan. Unfortunately both players went down with injuries. Something Poch has no control over. Yet all I hear is people blaming him for not having a RB right now.

If Foyth was planA then Poch deserved the criticism.

 

[Spursidol]

If we can keep the squad nucleus of Foyth, Sanchez, Winks, Ndombele, Sessegnon, Lo Celso, Dele, Son, Lucas & Kane together for as long as possible we will be OK. I'm not saying that all of those are the future first XI, but all of them are absolutely fine be to add young and good quality deothntp the squad a team the very least.

Lloris, Walker-Peters, Aurier, Rose, Davies, Vertonghen, Alderweireld, Sissoko, Dier, Wanyama, Lamela & Eriksen are for me on borrowed time, I'm talking 1-2 more seasons max before we simp,y need to focus on either letting he, go or seeking as reasonable value. We could have got £40m+ for Dier a season or two ago, we'd never get anything near that now. We need to be streetwise and read between the lines as to when the best time to sell certain players is.

The gaffer needs to do what he can to integrate Skipp & Parrott into the first team squad/ bench by the end of the season. There we have two ready made players who can add to the depth, meaning we can focus on using our money in more pressing areas like at fullback, CB and eventually GK.

If our future squads can be built around Gazzaniga, Foyth, Sanchez, Walker-Peters (if he shows signs of it as the season goes on) Winks, Skipp, Ndombele, Sessegnon, Lo Celso, Dele, Son, Lucas, Clarke, Parrott & Kane that gives us 15 players we don't need to touch in a 25 man squad 16, possibly 17 with Dier and Davies who I might have been a little harsh on, with 8-10 required.

1 gk, 1-2 right backs, 2 cbs, 0-1 left backs, 1 dm, 1 cm, 1 am and potentially 1 fwd required if one of the younger ones aren't able to hack it at this level. Our choices are simple, we use the current base as our new spine and become a 6-7th place team or we use the current nucleus as fringe options/ depth and we focus on building a brand new spine. I don't want think we require backward steps at present,mew need to focus on first team starters and because of this, I think the rebuild will take 2 seasons, this Jan window, the summer and the summer after that.

Past mistakes are coming back to haunt us - about 6 years ago we sold David Button (club trained GK) for £500k since when he's had a decent career at Fulham and Brentford playing some 200 games before becoming back up GK at PL Brighton. And we sold Button to accommodate 3 overseas trained GKs (then Gomez Friedel and a young Lloris). Since then we have missed a few opportunities to buy decent but not not world beating English goalkeepers with PL experience for the 3rd GK position.

Whilst Alfie Whiteman (just 21), Brandon Austin ( just called up for E u21') and Jon De Bie (almost 20) have all looked decent in youth teams, none have played men's football other than a few games in the EFL Trophy v League 1 and 2 opposition for Spurs u23s. Yet all would have benefitted from loans to gain experience. Whiteman went on the pre season tour 2019 but didn't play for even one minute.

So whilst Whiteman was de facto 3rd GK this season, directly Lloris got injured, there was pretty much no option other than to re-sign free agent Michael Vorm as having Whiteman as back up with no experience was far too much of a risk, especially if Gazzaniga was unwell at any time.

The problem fundamentally is Spurs are back to having 3 overseas trained GKs - and we can only have 17 overseas trained players in the squad. And according to CL rules we have 18 and according to PL rules we have 17 such players.

Whichever competition we are looking at, now we have to include Vorm we have no spare spaces in he squad for overseas trained players ( but a couple of HG spaces free).

That means that in January to sign any overseas trained player we need to :

1. Sell one or both Wanyama and/or Aurier (these being our least productive players)
Or
2. Sell one or more of Alderweireld, Vertonghen or Eriksen, all of whose contracts expire at the end of the season
Or
3. Sell one or more of the fringe players who we would probably prefer to keep at least until the summer - my guess would be Dier, Sissoko and/ or Lamela.

Not properly managing the squad and clogging it up with overseas trained players is coming back to bite us.

Similarly the lack of any coherent strategy to develop our academy players between the ages of 18 and 22 (when they are either first team material or have been sold) is equally coming back to bite us. Had Whiteman been sent on loan 2 years ago he might have been a viable no 3 GK for us ( meaning Vorms return would not be necessary)....and 6 years ago had we valued HG players we should have retained Button as 3rd GK (and if not bought an HG player as 3rd GK.

January TW is not going to be easy for us to make progress, given that in the summer Wanyama and Aurier both found ways to avoid being sold.

 

[bus-conductor]

There's nothing wrong with this squad a decent GK, LB, RB, pair of CB's, Good footballing 6 and a couple of composed intelligent AM's couldn't fix.

 

[Park Lane Mark Twain]

Shocking that we are having to rebuild when in fact we should be evolving.

Here comes another 3-5 year plan...

Not really seeing as players do age and there's a shelf life for everyone.

Dembele, Trippier, Vertonghen, Rose, Alderweireld, alll have reached their peaks with us probably and time waits for no man. The only issue we have is Eriksen wanting to stick to his career plan which was to play in La Liga at some stage. If I know that this has been something he was open to doing ages ago then the club should have known there was a genuine possibility it would happen.

We ain't in bad nick. Our nucleus moving forward will still be Lloris, Sanchez, Foyth, Davies, Sessegnon, Winks, Ndombele, Dele, Lo Celso, Clarke, Son, Lucas & Kane. All have plenty of years left at the top, plenty of time to run on their contracts and the majority that are young in that group have plenty of scope to develop further still.

The biggest shame is that those 1-2 seasons where we had such a well balanced team that we couldn't get just one trophy over the line. If we can keep our squad growing around the 12 players mentioned in the last paragraph it will continue to evolve, just around a younger group instead of the old crew like Toby, Jan & Christian.

 

[harry7]

I’d like to say, I think the criticism towards Levy/Poch for the handling of RB is unfair. They sold Trippier who Poch clearly did not like as a player. And neither did the fans. His replacement was already on the squad. Foyth. His backup was going to be KWP. That was the plan. Unfortunately both players went down with injuries. Something Poch has no control over. Yet all I hear is people blaming him for not having a RB right now.

If you want to win the league; or indeed a trophy is it wise to go into a season with 2 players (Foyth/KWP) rotating in a position in which they have never had a full season? In fact Foyth has only played a handful of games at RB.

I'd prefer to think that Aurier is the preferred right back.

 

[Spursidol]

Tottenham Hotspur - Club profile

All information about Tottenham (Premier League) ➤ current squad with market values ➤ transfers ➤ rumours ➤ player stats ➤ fixtures ➤ news

www.transfermarkt.co.uk

How others see our players - the absolute values are never going to be 'correct' as that can only be determined y the market.

What might be of interest is the order in which players are valued - Wanyama sticks out like a sore thumb in this if his knees are as bad as rumoured.

Anyway, an interesting list

	Harry Kane H. Kane Centre-Forward	Harry Kane	Jul 28, 1993 (26)		£135.00m
23	Christian Eriksen C. Eriksen Attacking Midfield	Christian Eriksen	Feb 14, 1992 (27)		£90.00m
20	Dele Alli Dele Alli Attacking Midfield	Dele Alli	Apr 11, 1996 (23)		£81.00m
7	Heung-min Son H. Son Left Winger	Heung-min Son	Jul 8, 1992 (27)		£72.00m
28	Tanguy Ndombélé T. Ndombélé Central Midfield	Tanguy Ndombélé	Dec 28, 1996 (22)		£58.50m
6	Davinson Sánchez D. Sánchez Centre-Back	Davinson Sánchez	Jun 12, 1996 (23)		£49.50m
18	Giovani Lo Celso G. Lo Celso Central Midfield	Giovani Lo Celso	Apr 9, 1996 (23)		£45.00m
4	Toby Alderweireld T. Alderweireld Centre-Back	Toby Alderweireld	Mar 2, 1989 (30)		£36.00m
27	Lucas Moura Lucas Moura Right Winger	Lucas Moura	Aug 13, 1992 (27)		£36.00m
15	Eric Dier Eric Dier Defensive Midfield	Eric Dier	Jan 15, 1994 (25)		£36.00m
19	Ryan Sessegnon R. Sessegnon Left Midfield	Ryan Sessegnon	May 18, 2000 (19)		£31.50m
5	Jan Vertonghen J. Vertonghen Centre-Back	Jan Vertonghen	Apr 24, 1987 (32)		£25.20m
1	Hugo Lloris H. Lloris Goalkeeper	Hugo Lloris	Dec 26, 1986 (32)		£22.50m
17	Moussa Sissoko M. Sissoko Central Midfield	Moussa Sissoko	Aug 16, 1989 (30)		£22.50m
3	Danny Rose D. Rose Left-Back	Danny Rose	Jul 2, 1990 (29)		£22.50m
33	Ben Davies B. Davies Left-Back	Ben Davies	Apr 24, 1993 (26)		£22.50m
8	Harry Winks H. Winks Central Midfield	Harry Winks	Feb 2, 1996 (23)		£22.50m
12	Victor Wanyama V. Wanyama Defensive Midfield	Victor Wanyama	Jun 25, 1991 (28)		£18.00m
11	Erik Lamela E. Lamela Right Winger	Erik Lamela	Mar 4, 1992 (27)		£16.20m
24	Serge Aurier S. Aurier Right-Back	Serge Aurier	Dec 24, 1992 (26)		£16.20m
21	Juan Foyth J. Foyth Centre-Back	Juan Foyth	Jan 12, 1998 (21)		£13.50m
29	Oliver Skipp O. Skipp Defensive Midfield	Oliver Skipp	Sep 16, 2000 (18)		£4.50m
16	Kyle Walker-Peters K. Walker-Peters Right-Back	Kyle Walker-Peters	Apr 13, 1997 (22)		£3.15m
22	Paulo Gazzaniga P. Gazzaniga Goalkeeper	Paulo Gazzaniga	Jan 2, 1992 (27)		£1.5m

 

[harry7]

But that's like asking Dele to drop back into Dembeles role and asking him to do the same job. Yes he can try but he won't be as effective

We need to buy a specialist DM to replace what we lost in Dembele

Dembele's role was to bring the ball out from the back and get it to Eriksen & Alli. Dembele's ability to skip past players meant that those marking Eriksen and Alli had to drop off their man to close down Dembele after he left their pressing midfielder behind him.

If that is not what we brought Ndombele for I'd be very surprised. Clearly Eriksen/Lo Celso are there to provide the creativity behind the attack and Winks/Dier/Sissoko to win the ball back.

 

[ElTel]

Dembele was not a DM

So buying a DM is in no way replacing Dembele

We need a proper DM. We cannot continue with Winks and another. The centre midfield is a mess

 

[ElTel]

I'm not sure Poch sees it that way.

Poch has now been here for about 5 years and has influenced a number of things including who is recruited into the Academy. Marsh ( now on loan at Orient) is the only "proper" DM we have and I suspect the oldest age group who were being recruited as Poch joined Spurs.

All the younger age groups have DMs who can play football with good level of passing etc - the best if those players are Jamie Bowden and Harvey White who were both included in the ore season squad this year and both might even play from the bench in the domestic cups either this season or next, they are both great prospects.

But that also suggests to me that Poch doesn't see pure DMs being necessary - he wants players who have good defensive skills but they must also be able to pass.

Winks was a traditional no ,,8 in the youth set up who Poch has coached and played as more of a 6/8 player, partly due to Wanyama and Dier not being available but partly I think that was always his plan.

And the rationale is that when Spurs play sides that park the bus the more players who can pass the ball in the side the better, and a DM without that skill will not be involved in the game that much.

So I think we will see the Ndombele/Winks partnership as being Pochs preferred CM2 with appearances by players like Lo Celso and Dele and Sissoko as rotation. Sure we will probably see Dier there but only because he is in the squad so Poch will use him whether as a DM, CB or RB, even if he's not Pochs preferred profile of player.

So I don't think we will buy s DM in the next 12 months.

If that's the plan then we will continue to struggle imo. The defence is too exposed to attacks, you can have 60-70 % possession but as we've seen in the PL every team has the ability to create openings and we will continue to concede, putting more pressure on the forwards to come up with 2 or 3 goals to win games. I don't even remember the last time we kept a clean sheet

Poch needs to get back to the formula that worked for him and his teams

 

[Spursidol]

Real get Eriksen then Poch

Old news rehashed.

TBH unless Madrid are desperate I'm not sure they'd bother signing Eriksen even on a free, his form has really plummeted this year, and unless he puts the effort in he'll end up at a club which is a less highly regarded than Spurs.

 

[Airfixx]

Considering who we bought this summer and the function they serve, for me it's evident that the rebuild/revamp has already begun.

The pisser about going out of the LC so soon is that we have less opportunity to break them and the kids in over the course of the season now....

 

[Mandy]

We've (probably) lost two fringe players and had our best transfer window in years, so now we need a rebuild?!
I'd say there's a couple of positions we need to strengthen depending on what happens with Eirksen, Vert and Toby, but I don't think we need a squad rebuild.

 

[sudoku]

If, as seems likely, Aurier leaves as well as Wanyama, we will have 13 non-HG and 6 HG in the EPL squad (total 19) and 15 non-HG, 2 association and 4 club trained in the ECL squad (total 21)
Means in January we can sign 1 non HG (2 if Parrott is removed from the ECL squad) and 2 HG players who can play Champion's League and for the EPL we can sign up to 3 non-HG and up to 5 HG players up to the maximum of 25.
All the players in the reduced squad will be given game time and that should keep most sweet.
Gives us a good chance to see how our new guys bed in and how good our academy players are.
Personally hoping in January we look more in the HG/EPL proven direction but would not say no to Olmo, providing he keeps up the good work.

 

[FightingIllini]

If we sell Wanyama, Aurier, and Eriksen we're gonna be pretty darned light on bodies. And then with Toby and apparently Jan on the way out? And maybe Rose too?