“From tonight we have to start to organise and to build a new team. I don’t think we have now to change too many players. We have 10, 11, 12 players good enough to stay. Good enough. Like players. Especially like people. And then we have to complete the squad with the first level of players.”
Roberto De Zerbi wasted no time after Spurs’ final-day survival was secured, swiftly and pointedly reminding those who run the club that promises were made amid the desperation to get him into the club at a time when relegation was starting to look unavoidable for a team that was sleepwalking into catastrophe.
Spurs have ended the season with a decent bit of momentum, 11 points from their final six games of the season representing frankly unimaginable improvement from what had gone before, and we’ve all seen teams use that kind of springboard to far better things in the very next season.
That can be Spurs’ future, but only if De Zerbi gets what he wants and Spurs do what they must. And what De Zerbi wants does, somewhat inconveniently, amount to something Spurs never, ever do.
There is already chat of ‘Never again’ after Spurs avoided what would have been the single most absurd, hilarious and humiliating relegation in Premier League history. But those same ‘Never again’ warnings were sounded and ignored last summer. It even cost a trophy-winning manager his job, because 17th place was so unthinkable a disaster.
If Spurs are to avoid another season of misery, an awful lot has to change.
The boardroom
Here’s where things get immediately ticklish, because it’s almost impossible to imagine meaningful lasting change at Spurs under an ownership regime that is failing hard.
Spurs had their problems before, but they were a profitable club. They are now one that is leaking money and racking up debts. Vinai Venkatesham was brought in to oversee significant change. Daniel Levy is gone, and so are all his most loyal and trusted lieutenants. The problem is that absolutely nobody who’s come in to replace them has done anything to inspire confidence that they can deliver.
Vinai’s Arsenal roots don’t help him, especially when decisions are being made that are so catastrophic it’s almost easier to imagine they are being made by an Arsenal sleeper agent than in good faith.
We still can’t quite believe how long it took for Thomas Frank to be removed. We still can’t quite believe they went for Igor Tudor in his place. We still can’t quite believe just how hard they lucked out in convincing De Zerbi to take on what was starting to look like an impossible challenge.
Who knows what they’ve promised him, though, and more importantly whether they have the aptitude or desire to deliver on those promises. But deliver they must.
Spurs fans are very clear. They want Vinai out, and they want ENIC out. Both are understandable positions given the scale of the mismanagement and the malaise. But both are longer-term goals. Selling the football club to new owners is not a quick or straightforward process and there are few indications it’s even on the radar. ENIC and the assorted Lewis Family nepo babies are going nowhere for now, and nor is Vinai.
He should be, but he almost certainly isn’t. We do think Spurs can have some nice things this summer, but we doubt they can have all the nice things.
The sporting director
But there is absolutely no reason whatsoever that change cannot occur at the next level down, where football operations meet boardroom operations. There is quite literally no justification for Johan Lange remaining as sporting director.
There is, very obviously, no one individual singularly responsible for why Spurs are where they are. But there is one who very conspicuously arrived at the club when they were sitting top of the Premier League in October 2023 and who has been present throughout the slump from those giddy early Ange Postecoglou days to the current shambling, hubristic, directionless mess.
There has been almost no incoming transfer during Lange’s time as, variously, technical director, co-sporting director or sole sporting director, that could be viewed as an unqualified straightforward success.
His reign currently stands to be defined by his near-disastrous pronouncement at the end of a January transfer window spent sitting on their hands that he was proud of the fact Spurs hadn’t panicked and that injured players would return.
Tricky thing, panic. Generally considered a negative response to any situation, but sometimes it is the only correct and natural response, and can drive necessary change. Spurs were certainly panicking by the time they went cap in hand to De Zerbi just two months later.
Sometimes if you’re not panicking it’s actually not because you’re a very sensible grown-up being in charge, but because you simply haven’t grasped the enormity of a situation that had by this point dawned on every single Spurs fan on earth.
He has to go.
Lange briefly worked alongside Fabio Paratici before Spurs granted his request to return to Italy, and there is much talk that Lange will soon once again be working alongside another sporting director.
It’s widely expected now that this will be former Borussia Dortmund sporting director Sebastian Kehl, who left the club in March after four years in the role. There is obvious appeal in what Dortmund are and how they operate with what the very best version of Spurs could be and once was.
If Kehl is a man Spurs think can get them back on track, and there’s every chance they’re right, then there is absolutely no reason to saddle a man who did the job at the second-biggest club in Germany with a spare part the fans despise and who has failed in every way imaginable.
Spurs should just back their judgement. If you’re getting Kehl in, then do it with your whole chest and get Lange out while you’re about it.
The medical department
We’re told that a sweeping overhaul of the various medical departments at Spurs is already under way, and not before time. Non-executive chairman Peter Charrington touched upon it in his open letter to fans after the conclusion to the season, a letter we can only assume he penned while dressed as a hot-dog, so determined is he to find the guys who did this.
There comes a point somewhere in the third season of an unprecedented injury crisis where you do have to start considering that it isn’t just rotten luck. There has been some of that, sure, but it cannot explain a season in which no senior player at the club has avoided the treatment room.
There are rumblings about the pitch at the new stadium, about whether its unusual design – the grass football pitch sits in shallow retractable trays atop the synthetic American football one – could be a contributary factor.
It may be. But what’s abundantly clear is that Spurs don’t just suffer a high number of injuries, far more than any other club in the division, but that those injuries are mismanaged when they occur.
Dejan Kulusevski has now been sidelined for over a year after suffering what was initially described as a ‘knock’ against Crystal Palace in May 2025. James Maddison suffered a partial ACL tear around the same time, was advised against surgery only to suffer a full tear in pre-season that kept him out of action until a few substitute cameos at the very end.
Mohammed Kudus suffered a season-ending setback in his own recovery from injury as Spurs pushed to get him back on the pitch, while Dominic Solanke has essentially never really been 100 per cent fully fit at any time of the season.
It seems certain that, at best, Spurs are exacerbating their misfortune in this area. At worst, something far more serious.
Outgoings
The off-field stuff that has to change can always feel a bit intangible. We’re all out of our comfort zone with that stuff, aren’t we? We all know something’s not right in how Spurs are being run, but it’s far harder to know precisely what than with the actual on-field action we all know and love (well, not love, but you know what we mean).
Now we get down to the core of the problem for Spurs. Everything else they do or don’t do in the short or long-term will be moot if they don’t end up with a significantly stronger and vastly more rounded playing squad next season. They are going to have to be extremely busy.
We’ll get to incomings in due course, but outgoings are at least as important. And a point of significant historical weakness for Spurs under Levy.
We saw tentatively encouraging signs in the way Spurs were willing to accept good-not-great money for Brennan Johnson to move him on early in the January window. Nothing he’s done at Palace suggests Spurs got that wrong.
Completely failing to replace him in the squad even after Kudus went down injured in the very next game is, clearly, a different matter. But Johnson’s sale was a solid bit of professional football trading done right. More of that please.
There are obvious departures from this squad. Cristian Romero is surely done, a wholly ineffective captain and an unreliable player. We have some sympathy, because it’s clear his reputation now precedes him and, subconsciously we’re sure, he is now treated differently by referees and pundits alike. His red card against Manchester United was widely accepted as straightforward, but has looked increasingly absurd as the season’s gone on and countless similar challenges have escaped similar punishment.
But he cannot be relied upon. He does take unnecessary risks, he does pick up bookings at an unstoppable rate, and you just can’t have a captain who misses as much of the season as he does.
The whole palaver around his return to Argentina in the week leading up to the final game was an unwanted and unnecessary distraction – one that again raises serious questions of those in all decision-making roles at the club because it was bizarre to have authorised his departure in the first place.
Romero has become more trouble than he’s worth, frankly, but the new contract he signed last summer means Spurs can get good money from one of his many suitors on the continent. It seems just entirely rational and uncomplicated that absolutely everyone involved would be happier and more fulfilled in their lives if Romero played for Atletico Madrid rather than Tottenham.
We suspect Richarlison has also played his final game for the club and he gets a passing grade for scoring 11 often vital Premier League goals in a season where Spurs were so, so poor going forward. We also don’t think De Zerbi rates Solanke; you don’t have to read too far between the lines to sense he’s been unimpressed with the striker’s latest injury absence at a crucial time.
There are probably no great secrets being exposed in suggesting Randal Kolo Muani’s loan deal will not be made permanent.
De Zerbi has been at pains to insist Guglielmo Vicario is still Tottenham’s number one, but counterpoint: he isn’t. He too surely leaves this summer, a return to Italy in all likelihood. In a Spurs season ruined by injuries, it’s odd to think that the most impactful in the end might well be the one that forced Spurs to go back to Antonin Kinsky, whose redemption after his Madrid humiliation – which really was only as far back as March – has been one of the great stories from the season’s closing weeks.
Retentions
De Zerbi’s claim that there are maybe 10-12 players good enough to play for Spurs among the current squad is absolutely mental and absolutely damning because it’s absolutely true.
Here’s our best guess at the group of players he definitely wants to retain: Kinsky, Porro, Van de Ven, Danso, Bentancur, Gallagher, Tel, Gray, Bergvall, Maddison and assorted injured lads around whom there is little choice at least in the summer.
We would place question marks against the names of Destiny Udogie and Radu Dragusin, although it’s worth noting that the latter was among those mentioned by name in De Zerbi’s off-the-cuff list of players to impress him over the last six traumatic and difficult weeks.
There has been talk that Joao Palhinha favours a return to Portugal, which is fair enough. But if he is at all open to the idea of his loan move becoming permanent then Spurs should do it. Everyone knows about his tackling and commitment, but it has weirdly been his penchant for a clutch goal that has made him so vital this season.
Without his late goals home and away against Wolves, or the nerve-settler against Everton on Sunday, the whole season might have looked very different indeed.
The most important retention of all does now feel like it’s Micky van de Ven. He’s had his worst season at Spurs, and it’s been very clear at times that he’d lost faith in the whole project. But he, Pedro Porro and Conor Gallagher have been the players most conspicuously revived and rejuvenated by De Zerbi. Good players who have remembered that fact.
Van de Ven was immense during the run-in, and looks a far more worthy recipient of the new-contract-and-captaincy reward than Romero last year. That should be a top priority, because losing both starting centre-backs this summer cannot be the plan.
Further decisions must be made about returning loan players. There are two in particular where big decisions are needed. Luka Vuskovic has been sensational in the Bundesliga for Hamburg, while Mikey Moore has excelled for Rangers. Both deserve at least a pre-season chance to stake claims for first-team squad places. Both occupy positions where Spurs will likely have room.
Incomings
This, really, is where Spurs’ summer will stand and fall and next season’s fate is settled. They cannot get this wrong, and everything else above feeds into it. But they are going to need some big new signings.
But maybe not quite as many as might first seem necessary. It would be foolish (and on brand) to rely on it entirely, but Spurs really could possess unprecedented levels of Like A New Signing energy next season.
Maddison, Kulusevski and Kudus all potentially qualify here, and all address the most glaring weakness in De Zerbi’s Spurs. De Zerbi saved Spurs’ season by making them far better at the back, allowing just 17 shots on target in his seven games compared to 41 in the previous seven.
But he could do almost nothing about Spurs’ moribund attack. He simply didn’t have the players to do what was necessary there. The guile of Maddison, the hard running and eye for goal of Kulusevski and Kudus’ dribbling all offer something vital that Spurs have missed terribly.
How many of that trio return at the level required, who knows, but it makes life far easier if they do.
There still need to be major incomings, though, and De Zerbi was at pains on Sunday night to outline his ‘dream’ that such players would be both a) ‘first level’ players and b) here in time for pre-season. The World Cup makes it impossible really to expect all business to be wrapped up with a bow on it before pre-season begins, but the more business is done early the better.
Spurs know they must also attract the right types of personality. That was a big part of Gallagher’s appeal, and explains the ongoing interest, revived from January, in securing the free-agent services of Andy Robertson. That feels like a no-brainer; he won’t play every week but in terms of what he brings in terms of experience and nous to the squad on and off the pitch he can operate as a kind of Gilded Ben Davies.
Marcos Senesi is another potentially quick incoming that Spurs might be able to pull off. They have first mover’s advantage there, and must now hope that’s enough to keep reported interest from Liverpool and Barcelona at bay.
Another goalkeeper must come in, whether that’s to be the clear number one or compete with Kinsky for the gloves. James Trafford has long been touted and remains an option, although he would want clear assurances about first-choice status, you’d imagine, after having his fingers burned at Man City.
But the glaring and hardest-to-fill holes in the squad will be in attack. Spurs will need at least one and very likely two new No. 9s this summer unless they think Will Lankshear is ready for a full squad role after an impressive season with Oxford.
We’re not really sure that’s how they should see it, and bringing in two new strikers to hit the ground running is far easier said than done, and who those players are and where and when and above all else if those players arrive is going to be key to the whole caper.
Further attacking options for the wide and 10 positions can be considered, but Spurs can for now at least look to run a leaner squad.
With no European football, they will be playing 40-odd games next season as opposed to this season’s 52.
But the main point about incomings is that Spurs really might not need as many as you’d initially think to turn a current 12-man squad into something genuinely competitive. But they will still need a lot, they will still need a good chunk of that business done early, and they will need a significant change in luck and direction with injuries.
It remains the tallest of orders for a regime with absolutely no room now for error.
