The Tottenham Hotspur Rebuild, Part 1

When we started the rebuilding series, we knew that Liverpool and Manchester United were going to come first, but we weren’t sure who readers wanted to hear about after that. We put it to a vote, and you guys went overwhelmingly for Tottenham Hotspur.

There’s no other team in England with more up in the air right now. The Europa League final could seriously impact their budget and their ability to attract top talent. It could also affect whether or not they fire their manager. And, as you’ll read about below, no one outside of a couple people at the top of the club have any idea what their org chart looks like at the minute, and who will be responsible for recruitment once the transfer market opens.

Due to some scheduling stuff, yesterday’s podcast is a rumours roundup, and the boys will tackle rebuilding Spurs on the pod next week.

The next section is written by Ted, and the rest is from Kim, so you know who to praise/yell at.

What is their deal?

Spurs are in the midst of a back room re-shuffling that has been complicated by a Europa League final appearance. Awkward… all this on field near-success getting in the way of necessary spring tidying. Regardless of the result, they are clearly making moves across the structure of their football department. Former Arsenal executive Vinai Venkatesham will be taking the reigns as CEO, while Chief Football Officer Scott Munn is rumoured to be moving on.

Johan Lange is currently their technical director, while Fabio Paratici is being heavily briefed for a potential return after serving a 2.5 year FIFA ban for “financial irregularities” from his time at Juventus. And Ange Postecoglou is Schrodinger’s Head Coach with an Australian accent.

What to make of *waves hands* all of this? For starters, it’s a lot of titles with frequently overlapping responsibilities. Maybe they saw Chelsea and Manchester United’s structures with TOO MANY DUDES on the football admin side of the business and thought, “we need to emulate that.”

On the other hand, if Spurs WIN the Europa League, they are suddenly a Champions League team despite finishing just outside the relegation spots in the Premier League. Which is weird. In fact, this kind of has to be Spurs’ strangest Premier League season, right?

Also deeply weird is the renewed romance with Paratici. His initial stint at the club was a mixed bag and the fairly ominous clouds over his head from the Juventus time would be brushed under the carpet in Italy, but remain troubling for a Premier League that prefers its image — and those of its clubs — to be squeaky clean these days.

*camera pans to Evangelos Marinakis*

The world of football is complicated, okay?

Paratici is described by the BBC as “one of the most respected football executives in European football” which feels like either a stretch or an indictment.

Juve’s success during Paratici’s involvement there was attached to some level of tax/accountancy legal trouble and a flow from the magic money tree that continues to cripple the team today. He is regarded as a deal-maker. Often in football, said deals require grease to get done, and the people making them are greasers-in-chief, with additional lubrication finding its way wherever necessary.

In certain football economies (and historically at times in England), it’s bungs that made the economy go round.

Reports say Paratici’s charming, and his early years were bootstrapped scouting with a supposed eye for talent, though credit is always complicated to assign. The political victors typically claim all of the positives and assign the dregs to the also rans, and Paratici has definitely been a victor through most of his career progression.

Paratici wasn’t really gone from Spurs — he continued as an “unofficial consultant” even during his ban, which kind of makes me wonder if Daniel Levy just genuinely likes working with him. That happens sometimes, and is as good an explanation for this spring’s weirdness at the top as anything.

It’s not the kind of arrangement you’d expect these days, and certainly not at Spurs, but if we pretend it’s actually been that way the entire time — more or less — then it’s explicable?

Arguably, shouldn’t there be more change after this platypus of a season? I have no idea. Maybe ask the Australians still at the club for now — we don’t usually deal in these sorts of animals.

—TK

Current status

Despite being Europa League finalists, the current status of Tottenham Hotspur is: Bad.

They actually started the season playing very well, getting some unlucky results while putting up huge positive xG differentials on their opponents. But then injuries started piling up, and the unlucky losses turned into deserved losses.

Bad line go up, good line go down.

Once it became clear that Spurs did not have any chance of qualifying for Europe through league placement or getting relegated, they shifted their focus towards the cups and Europa League, accelerating this downward trend.

This weekend’s 2-0 loss to Crystal Palace is about as checked out as you’re ever going to see a team in the Premier League. Which was a bit strange, given that the backups who were given an opportunity are ostensibly fighting for a role in a European final, and perhaps their jobs generally?

In any event, Tottenham have absolutely sucked in the Premier League this season. This, despite all of the misfortune with injuries and run to the Europa League final, is why Postecoglou could potentially get sacked even after winning a trophy.

Who should they keep?

Before diving into this, it is completely insane that it’s May and we don’t know who is running recruitment for Tottenham Hotspur. I’d like to hope that they’re very sure, and roles are clearly defined, and that information has just not quite made its way to the public yet. But it’s entirely possible they’re still working this out, which is terrifying.

Anyway, the first question that Tottenham’s head of recruitment will need to answer is what to do about Mathys Tel. He has a €55m purchase option from Bayern Munich, which I cannot imagine will be executed. He’s shown flashes of big potential in his time at Tottenham, but certainly nothing approaching the type of performances you’d want to see for that fee.

That doesn’t mean Tel is definitely gone, though. Spurs will likely try to negotiate a lower fee, and Bayern will have a tough decision to make about whether to take a cut price or try their luck with another loan elsewhere.

If James Maddison could play 35+ games, Spurs would probably be decent. Unfortunately, he’s quite injury prone. But when he’s fit, he does this, so he’ll still be on the team next year.

I imagine that Spurs would very much like to keep both of their starting fullbacks, though both are likely to attract offers from big clubs. Pedro Porro is one of the best attacking right backs around, while Destiny Udogie put up some impressive defensive numbers while being solid at progressing the ball.

Dominic Solanke did not exactly live up to his £55m price tag, but he also wasn’t bad. He had a couple injuries, and played on an otherwise injury-plagued team that had an average midfield. He made up for his lack of goal-scoring by doing a lot of pressing work. This is a good player that Spurs will want to keep on their team, even if they were expecting 5 or 6 more goals out of him.

Lucas Bergvall had a solid debut season, while Pape Matar Sarr continues to be Mildly Disappointing But OK I Guess. As the youngest members of the Spurs midfield that is in need of a serious overhaul, they should both stick around. They kind of have the same problem as the more experienced midfielders, where they put up some solid looking defensive numbers and provide some decent carrying value, but seemingly cannot pass.

Expect Bergvall to grow into a much bigger role next season, while Sarr might be heading into a final “prove it” year before Spurs consider moving him on.

And some bullet points on other guys:

• Son Heung-Min is slowly declining but still very good. He’ll stick around and remain a plus contributor, but it’s pretty clear they can’t rely on him to be the entire attack anymore. He’s evolved a bit as a playmaker as he’s lost a half step of pace, which is a big plus.

• Mickey van de Ven’s injuries and stats taking a hit should keep the vultures away for another year. If he was at his best this season he might have been on his way to Real Madrid.

• The goalkeeping department is stable. Guglielmo Vicario was solid but not spectacular. Antonín Kinský has looked very promising since joining in January.

• Early returns on Kevin Danso are… he’s fine. Reasonable rotation CB at a reasonable price. Nothing more, nothing less. Radu Drăgușin is also a guy who exists, and I’d be fine with Spurs either keeping him another year or trying to get their money back.

• Brennan Johnson gets high quality shots and kicks them in the goal. He does almost nothing else. This one useful skill will keep him in the team.

• Djed Spence had a surprisingly solid season, and has shown that he can fill in at left back if necessary. He should continue to be a very useful squad player.

• We’ve seen promising stuff from the youngsters Wilson Odobert, Mikey Moore and Will Lankshear, but not enough to make any kind of evaluation about their future. They should all get more minutes next year.

• Archie Gray needs a mention here, since he’s definitely not in the “for sale” section. He was awful at both center back and central midfield, there’s no sugar coating it. He’s also just 19 and was excellent at Leeds last season, so he’s going to get another chance.

Who’s for sale, and what’s their budget?

First up, the frees. Goalkeeper Fraser Forster, CB/LB Ben Davies, and left back Sergio Reguilon are all expected to leave at the expiration of their contracts. Timo Werner’s loan is also expiring, and he will not have his purchase option taken up. Those players leaving gets about £20m off Spurs’ already well-managed wage bill.

Tottenham will be open to offers for both Rodrigo Bentancur and Yves Bissouma, who are getting into their late 20s and have just one year remaining on their contracts. It’s very much selling time. I promise these aren’t the exact same radars from the two younger guys.

Spurs desperately need to replace Bentancur and Bissouma with players who can do something with the ball at their feet. They’re defensive midfielders who give the team some competent ball-winning capability, but they’re not elite enough ball winners to justify their inclusion in the team, given their lack of other contributions.

The injury-prone Richarlison is also a likely sale candidate, with Everton and Saudi clubs being linked recently. He hasn’t been able to play much, but he’s actually put up pretty superb numbers in a tiny sample, which might coax someone into taking a chance on him.

All of the above is uncontroversial, but this opinion might be an unpopular one: It’s not a bad idea for Spurs to raise some money by selling Cristian Romero. He’s reportedly wanted by Atlético Madrid, and interested in the move.

His personal downturn has been in line with the team’s, so I wouldn’t argue with a take that his stats would bounce back if he was on a good team. But he wasn’t very good this season, was injured for a lot of it, and has 2 years left on one of Spurs’ most expensive contracts. If Atléti are willing to pay in the €40-50m range and he’s not willing to extend his contract at a wage that fits inside your current structure, I’d take the money.

Guessing at a budget for Spurs is always difficult, given the conservative nature of their spending relative to their financial rivals. Daniel Levy is certainly willing to authorize spending if he thinks it’s necessary — Solanke was a club record transfer, after all — but the team is generally reluctant to invest in players that they don’t feel they’re likely to sell for a profit.

They’ve also kept their wage bill tight. A “bad” Spurs signing only costs them £3-5m a season, while Man United are suffering from death by a thousand £8-10m papercuts.

But this is a club very clearly in need of investment, and their terrible league performance this season should be a wake up call to the board. The clubs in the financial tier just below Spurs have caught up. Lower budget teams like Brentford and Bournemouth are now rich and smart enough to overtake a penny-pinching version of Tottenham. The days of a guaranteed top 6 finish from having roughly the 6th biggest budget are over.

If Tottenham Hotspur have any desire to compete for Champions League places again, they will need to invest heavily in new players. Tomorrow, we make some suggestions.

—KM

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