Football.London

Pre-season is now in full swing under Tottenham head coach Ange Postecoglou as the Australian embarks on his second summer in charge.

The 58-year-old became the first manager at Spurs in half a decade to complete a full season in charge of the club when the team ended the Premier League campaign in fifth place in May. Now the Australian must plot the way forward in his second time around to realise his expectations of Tottenham competing with those at the top of the table next season.

Postecoglou has reshuffled his coaching staff with a promotion for Matt Wells to replace Chris Davies, following his switch to become Birmingham City's head coach, and the arrival of two new coaches in Nick Montgomery and Sergio Raimundo to create a bigger coaching staff than last season, adding to Ryan Mason, Mile Jedinak and goalkeeping coach Rob Burch.

The arrival of former Central Coast Mariners and Hibernian manager Montgomery and his assistant Raimundo within the coaching set-up creates an unusual dynamic within the staff under both Postecoglou and the younger Wells.

Our Tottenham correspondents Alasdair Gold and Rob Guest discussed that dynamic and its potential effects in the latest episode of their podcast Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham, with the pair having passed the milestone of 150 episodes of the show. The duo also spoke about what has happened so far in pre-season, the players that are back, the new faces in Lucas Bergvall and Archie Gray, the youngsters joining in and what all of their futures hold as well as the potential arrivals in the weeks ahead.

You can listen to the episode in podcast format by heading right here or you can watch the show on YouTube by going here.

Listen to the latest episode of Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham featuring lots of chat on pre-season so far, click here for in depth Spurs chat on your preferred podcast platform.

Tottenham Hotspur are in advanced negotiations over a huge new matchday shirt sleeve sponsorship deal which is expected to be announced as early as this month, football.london understands.

Spurs' shirt sleeve partnership with Cinch was meant to last five years after being signed in 2021, but the online car-selling company is believed to have exercised an early exit option as it pulls back on its sponsorship commitments, having done the same with its Scottish Premiership Football League deal.

That early exit looks to have benefited Tottenham greatly as football.london understands that they made the most of rising sponsorship valuations and are in advanced talks to agree a matchday shirt sleeve deal with a new partner that will dwarf the £10million a year they were getting from the Cinch deal and it should be announced in the coming weeks.

Sponsorship deals have come even more into focus in recent times because they help clubs comply with the Profit and Sustainability Rules and allow them to spend more money during transfer windows without falling foul of the stricter Financial Fair Play laws, which have brought fines and docked points as punishments this season, with more to come.

Tottenham were previously involved in some preliminary negotiations with the SA Tourism arm of the South African government about sponsorship, including their shirt sleeves, which ended up not making it through the rounds of approval within that country. Reports in South Africa in February last year claimed it was a three-year deal worth just under 911million rand, which would have been £42.5million with the exchange rate at that time (it would be worth £3million less with today's rate). That would have placed the new deal back then as being worth more than £14million-a-year.

Earlier this month Spurs announced a new three-year training wear sponsorship deal with BetMGM, which is worth a reported £10million a year. While last year Premier League clubs agreed to remove gambling logos from matchday shirts from the 2026/27 season onwards, they will be allowed to use them on training wear, sleeve sponsorship and advertising around their stadium and training grounds.

Fans will have neither BetMGM nor the new shirt sleeve sponsors on the apparel they buy though as with both their new home and away Nike kits launches this month, Spurs said: "For the 2024/25 season, all of our kits will be sold without the sleeve partner logo, and our training range will be sold without the training wear partner logo. These are excluded from retail inventory for the coming season."

Listen to the latest episode of Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham featuring lots of chat on pre-season so far, click here for in depth Spurs chat on your preferred podcast platform.

Tottenham Hotspur are in advanced negotiations over a huge new matchday shirt sleeve sponsorship deal which is expected to be announced as early as this month, football.london understands.

Spurs' shirt sleeve partnership with Cinch was meant to last five years after being signed in 2021, but the online car-selling company is believed to have exercised an early exit option as it pulls back on its sponsorship commitments, having done the same with its Scottish Premiership Football League deal.

That early exit looks to have benefited Tottenham greatly as football.london understands that they made the most of rising sponsorship valuations and are in advanced talks to agree a matchday shirt sleeve deal with a new partner that will dwarf the £10million a year they were getting from the Cinch deal and it should be announced in the coming weeks.

Sponsorship deals have come even more into focus in recent times because they help clubs comply with the Profit and Sustainability Rules and allow them to spend more money during transfer windows without falling foul of the stricter Financial Fair Play laws, which have brought fines and docked points as punishments this season, with more to come.

Tottenham were previously involved in some preliminary negotiations with the SA Tourism arm of the South African government about sponsorship, including their shirt sleeves, which ended up not making it through the rounds of approval within that country. Reports in South Africa in February last year claimed it was a three-year deal worth just under 911million rand, which would have been £42.5million with the exchange rate at that time (it would be worth £3million less with today's rate). That would have placed the new deal back then as being worth more than £14million-a-year.

Earlier this month Spurs announced a new three-year training wear sponsorship deal with BetMGM, which is worth a reported £10million a year. While last year Premier League clubs agreed to remove gambling logos from matchday shirts from the 2026/27 season onwards, they will be allowed to use them on training wear, sleeve sponsorship and advertising around their stadium and training grounds.

Fans will have neither BetMGM nor the new shirt sleeve sponsors on the apparel they buy though as with both their new home and away Nike kits launches this month, Spurs said: "For the 2024/25 season, all of our kits will be sold without the sleeve partner logo, and our training range will be sold without the training wear partner logo. These are excluded from retail inventory for the coming season."

Listen to the latest episode of Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham featuring lots of chat on pre-season so far, click here for in depth Spurs chat on your preferred podcast platform.

Virgil van Dijk's mixed record against Harry Kane could be a cause for concern for his Netherlands team-mates ahead of the Euro 2024 semi-final against England.

The two will face off once again in Dortmund on Wednesday as both nations strive to make it to only their second-ever Euros final. Kane, who frequently clashed with the Liverpool defender during his Tottenham days, has an impressive track record against the 33-year-old.

The England captain has netted six times in 10 appearances against one of Europe's top centre-backs, and their personal duel will be key to the outcome, assuming Kane retains his spot. Wes Brown, the former Manchester United and England defender, believes Van Dijk's past encounters with Kane might be weighing on his and his team-mates' minds.

Speaking on Reach's new Euro Thrash podcast, available on YouTube, Apple and Spotify, Brown said: "Those little match-ups, they are talked about. Not just by pundits, but in the changing room.

"You know you do well against this person, that this person is the nightmare and always scores regardless whether he plays bad or not. They are personal battles that come into games.

"Six out of 10 for Kane against Van Dijk is not bad. I am not saying it was him who was marking him for all the goals, but ultimately Van Dijk will know that as well. Kane will get confidence from that, he will know that he has scored against him before and will want to do it again.

There have been calls in some quarters for Kane to be dropped for the game following some quiet performances, but Liverpool's Trent Alexander-Arnold has warned that benching Kane would be a gift to the Dutch side. He said: "Anyone facing England would like to see Harry Kane not playing. We're talking about England's record scorer.

"He's scored two in this tournament, helped us win games and, as our captain, leads by example and puts everything into games. People will always have opinions but he is leading us into a semi-final.

"He is part of the reason why the environment is such a good one in camp. And he is a reason why we're heading into a semi."

Tottenham's players are now on day four of pre-season work back at Hotspur Way as Ange Postecoglou continues to shape the club for the coming season.

The Australian has enjoyed a summer relaxing in Greece, after first remaining in Melbourne for a few days following Spurs' post-season friendly against Newcastle there, before he later took on some punditry duties with ITV at Euro 2024. Postecoglou returned to Hotspur Way amid that TV work to start preparing for the new season and then returned fully on Friday ahead of the players coming back on Saturday.

The hard work starts now for the Tottenham head coach and here are five things to focus on when it comes to his pre-season to-do list.

Settle in the new boys

There were two new faces at Tottenham this week and a returning one. Spurs agreed a £40million transfer package for Archie Gray with Joe Rodon heading in the opposite direction to Leeds United and that came after the north London club struck a deal with RB Leipzig to bring Timo Werner back for a full season this time.

Then there is Lucas Bergvall, who was signed in February in an £8.5million deal from Djurgarden and the bright blond Swede finally arrived at the weekend and was shown having a car park catch-up with Postecoglou on Saturday after pulling up.

While Werner will already have a head start in knowing what the Australian demands of his players, this is going to be a crucial period for Gray and Bergvall to settle into the coach's very different philosophy with a lot of pressure placed on the midfielders to take on plenty of tactical instructions.

Both 18-year-olds are rated among the best at their age group in their respective countries so they are expected to thrive within their new club and Postecoglou and his coaches will be working to ensure that transition is as seamless as possible as they adapt to the step up.

Get his methods across to the new coaches

It's not just new players for Postecoglou to work with this week as he must fully bring two new coaches into his way of working. There's an unusual dynamic in the new-look, bigger coaching team this season with the Spurs boss bringing in a manager and his assistant to work beneath him and newly-promoted senior assistant coach Matt Wells.

They are Nick Montgomery and Sergio Raimundo, who worked together at Central Coast Mariners to take them to the A-League title and then in a less successful spell at Hibernian in Scotland. Postecoglou normally imparts his ideas very quickly to new coaching staff - he's used to constantly changing his set-up at every club he manages - but there will also be an added focus no doubt on how Wells leads the staff with this very set duo amongst it and uses it to Tottenham's advantage.

There are also Ryan Mason, Mile Jedinak and goalkeeping coach Rob Burch in the bigger team than last season, having replaced Chris Davies with the two newcomers.

Constant transfer chats with Johan Lange

While Postecoglou has two new young faces to work with already in pre-season and that returning one in Werner, he will want more newcomers to work with as the days pass if he is to build a team that he expects to challenge further up the Premier League table next season and take on the many fixtures that the newly-expanded Europa League brings as well.

Postecoglou's relationship with technical director Johan Lange is key and the two men will remain in regular contact at Hotspur Way. In Melbourne, the Australian said he was "really comfortable" with the plan that he and the Dane had agreed upon with the club for the transfer window.

He also told football.london that he wanted signings in through the door in order to be involved in pre-season rather than mostly coming later on towards the end of the transfer window. We will soon find out when Postecoglou begins to talk - if he does - after the early pre-season friendlies whether the original plan is on track and it involves players currently playing at the Euros or Copa America, or whether it is moving slower than expected.

Looking at the varied movement elsewhere, with little happening yet at the top sides in the Premier League, the likelihood is that it's somewhere in the middle.

Decide on bids for current players

Postecoglou is currently working with a number of players who were not in his plans last season, including the likes of Djed Spence and Sergio Reguilon. While decisions over moves for players like that will be left to the hierarchy, the Spurs boss will need to have more of a say if offers come in for those who could go either way this summer.

Postecoglou used Emerson Royal a fair bit last season, filling in at centre-back on a number of occasions or on the left, but AC Milan are keen to take him to Italy. His compatriot Richarlison has publicly stated that he wants to stay at Tottenham but after two injury-hit seasons, the club are expected to consider any big offer that might come in, with Postecoglou given the final say. Bryan Gil will also be allowed to depart the club after three years with relatively little football.

The Spurs boss knows those players well by now and any decisions will likely be simple, while agreeing to the right loan for young academy players or keeping them for the Europa League squad might prove more complicated.

Manage the centre-back problem

With Micky van de Ven, Radu Dragusin and Cristian Romero having been in action at Euro 2024 or the Copa America, it means Postecoglou only has one natural centre-back for much of pre-season at his disposal in Ashley Phillips, who turned 19 a fortnight ago and spent the second half of last season on loan at Plymouth where he won their Young Player of the Season award.

Defenders Joe Rodon and Eric Dier have both left the club, the former to Leeds and latter to Bayern Munich at the end of his contract, while Japhet Tanganga was released at the conclusion of his deal. That would hand an opportunity for game time to Alfie Dorrington, but the 19-year-old academy centre-back is currently recovering from hamstring surgery and may not be back in training until August or potentially September.

Postecoglou will have to turn to full-backs Ben Davies and the Milan-linked Emerson to fill in at centre-back for as long as possible alongside Phillips, who will at least get the chance to show the Australian how much he has developed in the past six months.

Tottenham's pre-season campaign begins on Saturday with a behind-closed-doors friendly match against Cambridge United. Spurs then make their way up to Scotland to play Hearts in a friendly next Wednesday (July 17) before taking on QPR at Loftus Road on Saturday July 20. A couple of days later they fly out to Japan and South Korea for their summer tour, with matches against Vissel Kobe, a K-League All Star team and Bayern Munich before returning to N17 to face Bayern at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on August 10.

Dragusin could potentially return from the tour onwards if the Romanian decides to join up with the squad at that point after taking some well-earned rest.

Listen to the latest episode of Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham featuring lots of chat on Archie Gray by clicking here! In depth Spurs chat on your preferred podcast platform.

Ange Postecoglou has a large number of players back at Hotspur Way for Tottenham's pre-season but a section of them will likely only be returning temporarily.

One noticeable aspect from the gathering of first players back at the Enfield training complex is the number of players who are unlikely to start the season with the club. Some of them are those returning from loan spells away from Tottenham while others are being linked with moves away from the north London outfit this summer.

Spurs' non-international players were back on Saturday for their initial testing at Hotspur Way with the sports science staff before Sunday provided the return of training sessions under Postecoglou and his coaching staff. Captain Son Heung-min returned on Monday morning, the day he turned 32, after South Korea's international matches concluded that little bit later.

Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg, Micky van de Ven, Radu Dragusin and Guglielmo Vicario are not back yet, having been involved for their countries at Euro 2024 while Cristian Romero, Giovani Lo Celso and Rodrigo Bentancur have been in action at the Copa America in the USA.

Which players who have already returned to Hotspur Way could end up saying their farewells at Tottenham before the new Premier League season gets up and running with the trip to Leicester City on August 19. We take a look at the likely candidates.

Sergio Reguilon

The 27-year-old has only played 67 times for Tottenham since arriving four years ago in the summer of 2020. The Spanish left-back has spent the past two seasons on loan at Atletico Madrid, Manchester United and then Brentford and is not expected to be part of Postecoglou's plans again this coming season.

Reguilon has just a year left on his contract at the club and his impressive spell at Brentford in particular should ensure there are interested parties this month in ensuring his return to Hotspur Way is only temporary.

Djed Spence

Spence was shown this week reuniting with Archie Gray on the training ground pitches after their time together at Leeds last season before the Spurs right-back enjoyed a more successful loan period at Genoa in the second half of the campaign.

Genoa want to bring the 23-year-old back to Italy on a more permanent basis but have thus far been unable to agree a price for the full-back, who has three years left on his contract at the north London club.

He played 16 times for Genoa last season in Serie A and seven times for Leeds in the Championship. He has only played six times for Tottenham since arriving two years ago.

Bryan Gil

Another 23-year-old player signed under former managing director of football Fabio Paratici who just hasn't been able to find his place at Tottenham since arriving in 2021, with a string of loans to his name. Gil turned down a loan move to Brighton in January this year but only got 12 minutes of action after that.

He needs a move to kick-start his career again, with two years left on his contract at Spurs, and clubs across the continent have been considering him in recent months.

Troy Parrott

The 22-year-old Republic of Ireland international is yet to get involved with pre-season training. He has been at Hotspur Way though in the past week or so as he had been doing rehabilitation work on an injury picked up on international duty last month. That came after an impressive campaign in the Netherlands during which he scored 17 goals for struggling Excelsior Rotterdam despite their relegation from the Eredivisie.

football.london have previously reported that AZ Alkmaar are showing the most interest in signing Parrott this summer, but have not yet agreed a fee for the striker.

Emerson Royal

Postecoglou could need Emerson for a while this summer in the converted centre-back role he had last season because all of the senior players in that role have been on tournament duty, leaving 19-year-old Ashley Phillips as the only natural centre-back currently involved in first team training. Ben Davies can also play in that role as he did during the last campaign.

AC Milan have been showing the most interest in Emerson, as previously have Flamengo and sides in the Saudi Pro League, but the Italian side will have to meet Tottenham's valuation if the Brazilian is to be prevented from going on the pre-season tour to Japan and South Korea later this month with the Spurs squad.

Alejo Veliz

Likely to be a loan departure here but Veliz has been back at Spurs for pre-season training this week following a near pointless spell at Sevilla in the second half of the previous campaign where game time was near non-existent.

The 20-year-old is likely to get another loan move to continue his development because his foreign player status means Tottenham might not be able to register him for the Europa League, depending on how the next few weeks go.

Jamie Donley

Another potential loan departure as Postecoglou has a decision to make over Donley. The Australian handed the 19-year-old three Premier League appearances and one in the FA Cup last season but there are a queue of clubs looking to take the talented teenager on loan next season.

That regular football and minutes could be more beneficial for Donley than the odd late appearance in the Europa League and domestic cup competitions at Tottenham in the months ahead.

Postecoglou could well have another good look at him this preseason but Championship clubs like Luton and Oxford United, as well as League One sides Birmingham City and Bristol Rovers have all been keeping an eye on Donley's situation.

Listen to the latest episode of Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham featuring lots of chat on Archie Gray by clicking here! In depth Spurs chat on your preferred podcast platform.

Tottenham Hotspur's pre-season campaign begins on Saturday with a behind-closed-doors friendly match against Cambridge United.

Spurs will take on the League One side at their Hotspur Way training complex this coming weekend on July 13 as Ange Postecoglou and his coaching staff begin to drill the next phase of their development under the Australian into the group of players available. The Tottenham players only returned for pre-season on Saturday to undergo tests with the club's sports science staff before starting training sessions on Sunday.

Captain Son Heung-min linked up with the side on Monday, the day of his 32nd birthday, after his international commitments with South Korea ran beyond those of some of his team-mates last month.

Tottenham will have a couple of new faces prepared to play their first match for Postecoglou in the shape of Archie Gray and Lucas Bergvall, who joined from Leeds United and Djurgarden respectively. Both 18-year-old midfielders will already have got the sense of the fast-paced, attacking football that Postecoglou demands from training sessions but the match against Cambridge will take that experience to the next level if they are deemed ready to take part.

Early behind-closed-doors friendlies are often more fragmented than official ones, with some training ground games split into three 30-minute segments in order to give players differing lengths of playing time depending on their varying fitness levels and the coaches a window to speak to the players.

Cambridge finished 18th in League One last season and will provide a test from a fitness aspect after starting their pre-season almost a week before the Tottenham players.

Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg, Micky van de Ven, Radu Dragusin and Guglielmo Vicario are not back at Hotspur Way yet, having been involved for their countries at Euro 2024 while Cristian Romero, Giovani Lo Celso and Rodrigo Bentancur have been in action at the Copa America in the USA.

While the Cambridge match for Tottenham's first team will be behind closed doors, so without a crowd, Spurs' U21s will be travelling down the road to Enfield Town in front of fans for a 3pm kick-off on Saturday.

Postecoglou's first team then travel to Scotland to play Hearts in an official friendly fixtures next Wednesday (July 17) before returning to take on QPR at Loftus Road on Saturday July 20. A couple of days later they fly out to Japan and South Korea for their summer tour, with matches against Vissel Kobe, a K-League All Star team and Bayern Munich before returning to N17 to face Bayern at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on August 10.

Listen to the latest episode of Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham featuring lots of chat on Archie Gray by clicking here! In depth Spurs chat on your preferred podcast platform.

Tottenham Hotspur's pre-season campaign begins on Saturday with a behind-closed-doors friendly match against Cambridge United.

Spurs will take on the League One side at their Hotspur Way training complex this coming weekend on July 13 as Ange Postecoglou and his coaching staff begin to drill the next phase of their development under the Australian into the group of players available. The Tottenham players only returned for pre-season on Saturday to undergo tests with the club's sports science staff before starting training sessions on Sunday.

Captain Son Heung-min linked up with the side on Monday, the day of his 32nd birthday, after his international commitments with South Korea ran beyond those of some of his team-mates last month.

Tottenham will have a couple of new faces prepared to play their first match for Postecoglou in the shape of Archie Gray and Lucas Bergvall, who joined from Leeds United and Djurgarden respectively. Both 18-year-old midfielders will already have got the sense of the fast-paced, attacking football that Postecoglou demands from training sessions but the match against Cambridge will take that experience to the next level if they are deemed ready to take part.

Early behind-closed-doors friendlies are often more fragmented than official ones, with some training ground games split into three 30-minute segments in order to give players differing lengths of playing time depending on their varying fitness levels and the coaches a window to speak to the players.

Cambridge finished 18th in League One last season and will provide a test from a fitness aspect after starting their pre-season almost a week before the Tottenham players.

Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg, Micky van de Ven, Radu Dragusin and Guglielmo Vicario are not back at Hotspur Way yet, having been involved for their countries at Euro 2024 while Cristian Romero, Giovani Lo Celso and Rodrigo Bentancur have been in action at the Copa America in the USA.

While the Cambridge match for Tottenham's first team will be behind closed doors, so without a crowd, Spurs' U21s will be travelling down the road to Enfield Town in front of fans for a 3pm kick-off on Saturday.

Postecoglou's first team then travel to Scotland to play Hearts in an official friendly fixtures next Wednesday (July 17) before returning to take on QPR at Loftus Road on Saturday July 20. A couple of days later they fly out to Japan and South Korea for their summer tour, with matches against Vissel Kobe, a K-League All Star team and Bayern Munich before returning to N17 to face Bayern at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on August 10.

Listen to the latest episode of Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham featuring lots of chat on Archie Gray by clicking here! In depth Spurs chat on your preferred podcast platform.

The Tottenham players are back in pre-season training at Hotspur Way and one at least temporary gap in the squad is very clear.

Ange Postecoglou and his reshuffled coaching staff have been putting the returning Spurs stars through their paces at the Enfield training complex after their summer holidays came to a close. The non-international players were back on Saturday for their initial testing with the sports science staff before Sunday brought the return of training sessions under Postecoglou and his coaching staff.

The staff features newcomers Nick Montgomery and Sergio Raimundo as well as newly-promoted senior assistant coach Matt Wells, along with Ryan Mason, Mile Jedinak and goalkeeping coach Rob Burch. They were working on Sunday and Monday with senior players outfield players James Maddison, Pedro Porro, Yves Bissouma, Richarlison, Dejan Kulusevski, Ben Davies, Pape Matar Sarr, Destiny Udogie, Brennan Johnson, Manor Solomon, Emerson Royal, Oliver Skipp, Bryan Gil and Timo Werner, who had his loan spell from RB Leipzig extended to the end of next season.

New signings Archie Gray and Lucas Bergvall have also been settling into their new home, while senior loan players such as Sergio Reguilon, Djed Spence and Alejo Veliz were also back in the mix. Academy products Dane Scarlett, Jamie Donley, Mikey Moore, George Abbott, Tyrese Hall, Luca Gunter and returning loan players Alfie Devine and Ashley Phillips were also involved.

Tottenham captain Son Heung-min returned on Monday, his 32nd birthday, as his international duties with South Korea saw him playing later into June than many of his team-mates.

However, one glance across those who have been taking part in pre-season so far shows one glaring misbalance within the squad Postecoglou has at his disposal during pre-season.

It comes because of the tournament football this summer, with Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg, Micky van de Ven, Radu Dragusin and Guglielmo Vicario having been involved at Euro 2024 and Cristian Romero, Giovani Lo Celso and Rodrigo Bentancur in action at the Copa America in the USA.

The main issue that comes from those absentees is that it means Postecoglou only has one natural centre-back for much of pre-season at his disposal in Phillips, who turned 19 a fortnight ago and spent the second half of last season on loan at Plymouth where he won their Young Player of the Season award.

Defenders Joe Rodon and Eric Dier both left the club this summer, the former to Leeds and the latter to Bayern Munich at the end of his contract, while Japhet Tanganga was released at the conclusion of his deal.

Ordinarily that would hand an opportunity for game time to Alfie Dorrington, but the talented 19-year-old academy centre-back is currently recovering from hamstring surgery and may not be back in training until August or potentially September, depending on how cautious the club are with him after a couple of lengthy absences last season.

As he did during the previous campaign, Postecoglou will have to turn to full-backs Ben Davies and Emerson Royal to fill in at centre-back for as long as possible alongside Phillips, who will at least get the chance to show the Australian how much he has developed in the past six months. Emerson has also been linked with an exit from Spurs, with AC Milan in particular keen on taking the Brazilian right-back to Italy.

Radu Dragusin is likely to be the first of the centre-backs to return with the Romanian having exited the Euros to Van de Ven's Netherlands in the round of 16 on July 2. With players offered three weeks off after international tournaments, if they choose to take that full amount of time, Spurs' first game of their pre-season tour to Asia will see them play Vissel Kobe in Tokyo on July 27, which could mean Dragusin could potentially link up with the squad for that match in Japan.

However, unless the 22-year-old Romanian, who shone at the Euros, chooses to cut short his holidays, Postecoglou will be forming a makeshift central defence for the friendlies at Hearts and QPR, as well as in any behind-closed-doors training ground friendlies in the days ahead. Versatile U21s captain and midfielder Abbott can also play in the middle of the backline if required and did that as well as playing at right-back last season for the U21s at times.

While they have not been shown training with the squad in the first few days, Postecoglou could look to others in the U21s' Premier League 2-winning side for reinforcements for the weeks ahead. Dante Cassanova, 20, played much of the second half of the season at centre-back for Wayne Burnett's side, while right-back Tyrell Ashcroft filled in at times around Dorrington's second hamstring injury.

Postecoglou also said that he wants the club to sign a new centre-back this summer to add another senior option to that of Romero, Van de Ven, Dragusin as well as Phillips and Dorrington.

"If you’re saying 'is it an area we can strengthen?', yes it’s an area we will probably look at," the Spurs boss said back in March. "With all these things it’s about trying to strengthen the group as much as anything else. If you think about when I first arrived, we had maybe six or seven centre-backs at the club. So it’s not just numbers. It's more about the ability of those players to play the football we want and to fit in to what we're trying to build here.

"I think it is an area of the park we will look to strengthen, but I think we’ll look to strengthen all areas of the park come the end of the season. That’s planning that’s already underway, and other people are in charge of it at the moment."

Listen to the latest episode of Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham featuring lots of chat on Archie Gray by clicking here! In depth Spurs chat on your preferred podcast platform.

Tottenham captain Son Heung-min returned to Hotspur Way on Monday following a big farewell before his flight from South Korea at the weekend.

The Spurs skipper, who returned to the club on his birthday having turned 32 on Monday, was handed a couple of extra days on his summer holidays as South Korea's World Cup qualifiers went on a bit longer than many of his team-mates' international commitments at the end of last season.

Son had matches in Singapore and South Korea last month which ensured his international duty did not end until June 11, which was two or three days after many of his colleagues were able to head off on their holidays. That meant that while the likes of James Maddison, Ben Davies and Dejan Kulusevski were all back at Hotspur Way for testing on Saturday and then training on Sunday under Ange Postecoglou and the coaching staff, Son was granted 48 hours extra before his return.

His departure from Seoul's Incheon International Airport on Sunday was met by large crowds as fans discovered he would be flying home that day. With most fully aware that he would be spending his birthday back in the UK, he was inundated with birthday cards from those who had turned up and even blew out the candle on one cake a fan had made for him.

Korean news channels caught his departure with Star News publishing the video below of his arrival at Incheon as the fans tried to hand over their cards to the player who registered 17 goals and 10 assists in 35 Premier League games last season.

Tottenham will experience Sonny-mania again this month as the popular 32-year-old and the squad will return to Seoul for the second half of a tour to Asia that first takes in Japan and then South Korea, during which the crowds will no doubt flock again to see the Spurs and South Korea captain returning with his team-mates, as they did two years ago.

For now, Son will have met a few new faces when he arrived at Hotspur Way on Monday morning in Lucas Bergvall and Archie Gray. Son sent Bergvall a welcome text when he signed and may well have done the same for Gray.

"It's crazy. I'm from Sweden! He's one of the best players in the Premier League and a real legend," Bergvall told football.london in May. "He texted me after I signed. It was really kind of him because he was at the Asian Cup and I think it was really something for him to do that when he was so busy. He's a really nice, kind guy for writing to me and making me feel comfortable."

Listen to the latest episode of Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham featuring lots of chat on Archie Gray by clicking here! In depth Spurs chat on your preferred podcast platform.