Did you forget about Radu Dragusin? You’d be forgiven if you had. The Romanian central defender has been out since injuring his ACL vs. Elfsborg in the Europa League last January 30. Ten months is a long time to be out of football.
Thomas Frank said in a press conference recently, when asked about injured players returning to the Tottenham Hotspur squad, that Dragusin was likely going to get some minutes in a closed-door friendly. That’s exactly what happened this morning — Spurs posted on social media that Radu got his first match minutes in a training game against Leyton Orient at Spurs’ Hotspur Way training center.
The club also posted a short video compilation of Radu in action during the match. It looked like the rest of the team was composed of academy kids; Radu was the tallest guy out there from what I could tell.
This is actually pretty huge for Radu, both physically and psychologically. The video is short, but shows Radu sprinting and not looking like he’s favoring his bum knee. There’s a long way to go from “45 minutes in training match against a League One reserve team” to “cromulent defender in a Premier League match” but it’s good to see. I have no evidence to prove this, but I have wondered since Ange Postecoglou left the club whether Dragusin’s much-discussed tactical deficiencies might be ameliorated somewhat under Thomas Frank as opposed to Ange’s high line. Looks like we may get a chance to find out before too long.
Best thing about that short video however was the hug from James Maddison at the very beginning. Madders and Dragusin are ACL Buddies, and both players compared scars and experiences in rehabbing from the same injury in a video Maddison posted to YouTube a few weeks back. I bet Maddison derived a great amount of joy watching Radu play for the first time, knowing that will eventually be him.
Update: He sure did! Maddison posted this on his Instagram stories just after this morning’s friendly. What a guy.