According to reports from The Evening Standard this morning, Tottenham boss Mauricio Pochettino is plotting an eight-man cull for the summer transfer window.
Despite already overseeing two transfer windows at White Hart Lane, the Argentine is yet to put his stamp on a team he inherited from Tim Sherwood and Andre Villas-Boas, instead turning to the club’s youth system to refresh Spurs’ starting Xi.
And having now had a whole season in north London to formulate his opinions, Pochettino is ready to decide who has and who hasn’t made the grade.
According to The Standard, the eight players set for the chop are; Vlad Chiriches, Younes Kaboul, Etienne Capoue, Paulinho, Mousa Dembele, Aaron Lennon, Roberto Soldado and Emmanuel Adebayor – four of which were signed by the Lilywhites in the same transfer window, amid Gareth Bale’s record-breaking departure to Real Madrid, in summer 2013.
The Standard also claim the Tottenham gaffer is targeting improvements in three positions – wide forward, central midfield and central defence.
I would definitely add Erik Lamela to that list of eight. How Poch can stick with him is beyond me…
Being a (free-sheet) London Evening Standard football story, calculations will be as follows. Eight-man clear out, implying as many replacements again, making a total of 16 players coming or going. Of who those eight might be, it’ll mean speculating on five or six footballer-names for each of those eight positions, making 40-48 players at the very least about whom speculative articles can be written with the same few limited facts plus a big photo each time. Allowing for those who we know are set to arrive (back) at White Hart Lane this summer — Milli, Lennon, Carroll, Holtby and Pritchard — far fewer names will end up coming or going than some readers think.
Have to disagree with you there a little, my friend. Evening Standard have said there’s only three positions Mauricio Pochettino is looking to strengthen, and many of the replacements are already in the squad. Although I’m sure someone will be brought in to replace Paulinho, Capoue and Dembele, for example, none have played anywhere near enough football to justify doing a three-for-three swap. Pochettino already clearly has Mason and Bentaleb in his long-term plans. Likewise, if Spurs buy a winger-forward of the James Rodriguez mould, they only really need one replacement for both Adebayor and Soldado as they usually play with just one up top. None of Chiriches, Kaboul or Lennon have contributed much at first team level for pretty much the whole season, so I dont think anybody is expecting Spurs to replace all of them, just to have more high-earners sitting on the bench.