Yesterday, there were some curious absences when Tottenham Hotspur announced their travelling squad for their Asia preseason tour. One of those absentees was 17-year-old winger Mikey Moore, who is reportedly looking to secure a loan for more playing time.
Enter everybody’s “favorite” Telegraph journalist, Matt Law, with his read on the situation:
Now that’s interesting.
Rangers were runners-up in last year’s Scottish Premiership, and as such have qualified for European football. In fact, they could be playing Champions League this season, up two goals on aggregate in their tie against Panathinaikos in the Champions League Qualification second round, with one of Viktoria Plzen or Servette to take on in the third round to enter the competition proper.
This means Rangers will have to juggle European football with a league campaign for at least part of their season, resulting in plenty minutes to be shared. They also are coached by ex-Southampton manager Russell Martin, who has Rangers playing a modern, possession and passing focused style; not unlike the tactics that Frank will attempt to implement at Spurs.
This makes a season at Ibrox a pretty good landing spot for Mikey. It’ll help grow the physical side of his game too (assuming he returns with his ankles intact), the Scottish Prem notorious for sometimes brutal play.
That said, sending somebody so young away from home is a risky move, and he would be a valuable asset on Spurs’ UEFA List B as a player you could actually trust to play some minutes in the Champions League. Those are just two reasons why reports have indicated Spurs would prefer to keep Moore at the club for the time being, an approach with which I don’t necessarily disagree; however, he also needs minutes under his belt to continue to develop, and he and his representatives have apparently pushed hard in their preference for a loan. In fact, this push for such a move have reportedly been as part of contract talks, according to Alasdair Gold, and as such, it does make some sense to accede to Moore’s request.
These sorts of moves generally progress pretty quickly, so I’m sure we’ll get more details in the coming days.