Cartilage Free Captain

Tottenham Hotspur completed its doubleheader day of friendlies with a 0-0 draw at League One side Luton Town this afternoon.

Using a split squad like many Major League Baseball sides do in the lead-up to the grueling 162-game season, Thomas Frank had his own version of this today.

With the first squad taking on Wycombe back at Hotspur Way — a game that resulted in a 2-2 draw — Frank got on the bus with other members of the squad and staff to Kenilworth Road for a 3 p.m. contest with former Premier League foes Luton Town.

Putting forth a strong enough squad that would dictate the pace of the game, Jamie Donley came in last second for Destiny Udogie to fill in the left back role. But, for the majority of the first half, Spurs kept the League One side at bay as Kevin Danso and Mickey van de Ven controlled the backline.

Overall, the match was a snoozer, as neither side really created any dangerous moments, but the bright spots came from the duo of Mohammed Kudus and Mathys Tel. With Kudus playing out on the right and Tel floating around in the striker role to the left wing, the link-up play between the two brought the best attacking moment of the first half. Tel won the ball from a recycled defense and made a turn off his control towards the box. With Kudus running down the middle, Tel chipped a pass past the Luton defender and onto the feet of Kudus, who had his shot cleared off the line.

Antonín Kinský came on for Guglielmo Vicario in the second half to be between the sticks. And as the game progressed in the second half, Frank left his starters on the bench for 60-75 minutes, as he wanted his players to get some key minutes under their belt with the start of the season just weeks away.

The first sub of the match for Spurs came to 16-year-old Junai Byfield, who replaced Danso at right center back. Byfield connected with Tel — who came into a center mid role to call for the ball — who took off with the ball and sprayed a cross the pitch ball to Brennan Johnson out on the left.

As the game continued, Frank made a series of substitutions to allow the academy kids to showcase their skills.

This is how the final 15 minutes looked for Spurs:

Kinksy

Kyerenaten

Roswell

Russell-Denny

Olusesi

Devine

Yang

Donley

Scarlett

Lankshear

In the closing minutes of the contest, Spurs had a chance to bag the winner, but Will Lankshear dragged his shot across the goal a little wide and outside the post.

Spurs now head off to Asia for the final leg of their summer tour, with Spurs taking on Premier League foes Arsenal on July 31st in Hong Kong and Newcastle United on August 3rd in South Korea.

The season is slowly creeping upon us, and although neither Spurs side got the win today, it is all about looking competent in what Thomas Frank is looking to build in his first year in charge.

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Tottenham Hotspur Match Reports

Tottenham 2-2 Wycombe: Pape Sarr scores brace in first friendly of doubleheader

Friendlies are about fitness, but there are some takeaways from the first of two preseason matches today.

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A preseason friendly doubleheader? In this economy? Tottenham Hotspur played the first of two preseason matches today, the first a closed door friendly and a late addition to the schedule against League One side Wycombe Wanderers. Pape Sarr had a brace in this one to cancel out two goals from Wycombe winger Junior Quitina in a match that ended up a 2-2 draw. Tottenham’s starting XI, listed below, got between 60-75 minutes of action before Frank shuttled on the U21s.

Friendlies are about fitness not about results, but there are a few things we can glean from a training ground friendly with no fans in attendance. Here are a few reactions from the early match.

Match reactions

I think we got a pretty good sense of how Frank’s going to set up his team from this match. in this one Spurs attacked in a 4-3-3 shape, with Pedro Porro pushing into attack and Ben Davies tucking in alongside Luka Vuskovic and Cuti Romero. Spurs didn’t do a ton of defending in the first half but when they did it was in a back four, with Porro and Davies playing as more traditional wide fullbacks.

Tottenham pressed Wycombe again under Frank, but not as aggressively as we came to see under Postecoglou. As a consequence, the defense didn’t look nearly as exposed as it did at times last season. There’s also opposition effects — this is a League One opponent and a friendly — but it was notable.

The biggest issues I noticed aren’t exactly unfamiliar. With this lineup Spurs are still lacking a creative passing midfielder; Spurs’ two best passers of the ball were in defense (Romero) and attack (Odobert/Son). Gotta hope that’s something still on the mind of Johan Lange in the transfer window.

Related, I don’t know if George Abbott is any good or not but he looked decently tidy out there as a late replacement in the lineup for Rodrigo Bentancur, who was out ill. Abbott had 33 matches and 4 goals on loan at League 2 Notts County last season; he’s probably earned another loan and a step up in competition.

Odobert looked really really bright in the first half on the right, not his preferred side. Had several good crosses, some cuts central into space, and a couple of good looks on goal including what turned out to be Sarr’s first goal.

Brandon Austin is living a charmed life. I’m convinced he’s not a very good keeper but he is indispensable due to him being the only club-trained player at Spurs right now, so he’ll be on lots of Champions League benches. Anyway, Quitirna’s first goal was a real howler by Austin; it bobbled a bit at his feet but he 100% should’ve saved that.

Richarlison looked fairly decent in his first action of preseason. He held the ball up well, had some good passing moments. I wanted to see more on the offensive end from him — he scuffed one shot and missed a half-chance in the air. Nice that there was an ambulance pitch-side for this one in the event his hamstring exploded again.

Luka Vuskovic continues to be Very Large™. He was not as impactful in this match, but Wycombe barely mustered any attack despite scoring two goals. Vuskovich “Pavlyuchenko’d” a shot late in the first half that might have ended up on the M25.

Cuti Romero did a Cuti thing in the second half and threw an elbow on a Wycombe attacker who was grappling with him for the ball. Would’ve been an easy yellow card in a competitive match, and Romero needs to be careful in those kinds of situations.

Pedro Porro caught a stray limb to the head that flattened him and made him bleed his own blood. Dude looked extremely pissed off from that moment until his eventual substitution at 75’. Anyway, he was good today overall.

As promised, Frank made a raft of changes in the second half. Tynan Thompson and Oliver Iroh came on at about 60’ and then a raft of changes at 75’, too many to mention but Spurs were basically a U21 side after that. 17-year-old Thompson was actually a pretty bright spark in his sub appearance — went close on a shot late and looked to be tidy on the ball as a sub for Odobert.

Not much time to make an impact, but I didn’t see anything especially noteworthy otherwise from the kids.

The team is now on a bus and heading to Luton for the second friendly of today’s double-header. See y’all back on SpursPLAY for Game 2!

Most of the time transfer rumors are fun, and cool. Sometimes they’re a bit of a drag, or they just make no damn sense. Like this one — according to the Telegraph, Tottenham Hotspur are working on signing 30-year old Bayern Munich defensive midfielder Joao Palhinha on a permanent transfer.

Look, I’m not going to hide my feelings about this rumor or sugarcoat it — this is dumb and a bad idea, and I would feel pretty disheartened about Tottenham’s entire recruitment structure if this turns out to be true. Yes, Palhinha is a true defensive midfielder destroyer, a desperate need in the squad last season under Ange Postecoglou, and one of the roles that everyone has been clamoring for in this offseason. Yes, he was pretty good when he played at Fulham a couple of seasons ago. If we were interested in signing the 27-year-old Palhinha that played at Fulham, that might change the calculus for me.

But Palhinha is 30, just moved to Bayern last season for £42m, and they are now apparently desperate to get rid of him after just one year in Munich, mostly because he’s been pretty much crocked since the moment he set foot in Germany. Palhinha played less than 1000 minutes and had just six league starts for Bayern last season in all competitions while dealing with numerous injuries, and he’s only getting older. Signing Palhinha would also likely mean one or both of Yves Bissouma or Rodrigo Bentancur are out of the club, and while I agree both of them should probably be sold trading in one or two 27-year-old midfielders for a crocked 30-year-old midfielder doesn’t feel like a particularly smart move.

Even he’s on form, Palhinha is a limited player — a good tackler, but he doesn’t do much beyond that, and he’s already heading into his declining years as a midfielder. A loan would be one thing, but Joao Palhinha is not Luka Modric — signing him to a multi-year permanent contract would not only be a dramatic shift from Spurs’ past transfer dealings but likely a fairly expensive one unless Bayern are so desperate to get him out that they’re willing to eat a lot of shit on his transfer fee with three years left on his contract. Palhinho is said to be on wages of about £170k/wk, instantly making him one of Tottenham’s top earners.

I hate this rumor and I hope it’s just Palhinha’s agent trying to drum up a market for him.

Ready for some more outgoing Tottenham Hotspur transfer rumors? Here’s one. According to the Mirror’s transfer tracker, Alfie Devine is a target for Championship club Millwall. No one likes them, they don’t care; they’ll happily snaffle up whatever talent keeps them in the Championship and hanging around the promotion playoff spots. Last season Millwall finished eighth.

The report doesn’t say, but I’d have to think that any move for Devine would be on loan. Alfie’s initial contract runs through 2027, so if he does head back out that makes next summer a pretty pivotal one, with the club needing to make a decision to either offer him a new deal or sell him. Who knows whether the club actually wants to offload him; we might get more clarity after this weekend’s friendly double-header against Wycombe Wanderers and Luton Town.

Devine did well on loan in Belgium with Westerlo, so a Championship loan feels like a good next step. We’ll see what happens.

If there’s one league in the United States that we might have some marginal knowledge of, it’s the USL Championship. This league is the second-tier of professional football after the MLS, although there’s no promotion/relegation system.

A good question to ask is: Why should we care?

I don’t know if you should, unless you live in close proximity to El Paso Locomotive FC or any of the other 23 teams in the league.

I simply became intrigued by it because of Orange County FC, which is currently eighth place in the Western Conference. This would technically would have been my “local club” when I grew up. It was founded in 1998 (who knew!) as Los Angeles Blues.

There are two conferences in the USL Championship: the aforementioned Western Conference and the Eastern Conference. Both are split into 12 teams, with the top eight advancing to the playoffs. That seems excessive.

It looks like they’re about halfway into the season. Here are the top four teams in each conference.

East: Charleston Battery, Louisville City FC, Louodon United FC, North Carolina FC

West: FC Tulsa, San Antonio FC, New Mexico United, Sacramento Republic FC.

I gotta say - it’s pretty bold to suggest an entire state like New Mexico is united around this one second-tier football club.

And if you’re asking where the defending champion Colorado Switchbacks FC are in the standings, I’ll tell ya: They’re in LAST.

Fitzie’s track of the day: How to Fight Loneliness, by Wilco

And now for your links:

The Athletic ($$): “The homegrown rule that will cost some Spurs players a place in the Champions League”

The Guardian: “Spain to face England in Euro 2025 final after Bonmatí’s extra-time strike sinks Germany”

Sky Sports: “Hugo Ekitike joins Liverpool: Eintracht Frankfurt striker completes £79m transfer to Premier League champions”

The stories about Son Heung-Min’s Tottenham Hotspur future aren’t going to go away anytime soon. Already this summer we’ve seen rumors that he’s open to leaving Spurs for another challenge, and we’ve seen reports that say he’s more likely to stay at Spurs for at least another season, possibly longer.

So let’s throw another log on the fire, shall we? Paul Tenorio, a senior soccer editor at The Athletic, is now reporting that MLS side Los Angeles FC are “pushing hard” to bring Sonny in this summer, but the decision will ultimately be decided by Son and Spurs.

We’ve written before on how LAFC wouldn’t be the worst place for Sonny to spend his twilight years. It’s a large metropolitan city with a big Korean population. It’s a marginally shorter flight back to Korea for international duty, and it’s a place where Son would do well and enjoy a pleasant lifestyle. LAFC have a Designated Player spot held for Sonny should he decide to take them up on the offer, meaning they could afford a decent transfer fee should they want to pony up the dough. Also Son could play against Lionel Messi a couple of times a season. There’s a lot to like there!

That said, the MLS record transfer is $22m, and people who watch a lot more MLS than me have said that LAFC typically only bring in players that they can later move on for profits. Their record transfer cost $11m. Adding an aging superstar in Son Heung-Min would be a definite shift for them — not that it wouldn’t happen, just that it’d be a change, and it’s unlikely they’ll want to break the bank for him. Even with one year left on his contract, I’d hazard a guess that Spurs would want more than £8m for their club captain and one of the best players in club history.

The report says that nothing is close to finished, just that LAFC want Son pretty badly. I bet they do! Anything is possible and I wouldn’t completely rule out an exit, but to me it feels like a January departure to LA (or elsewhere) is more likely — it’s the start of the MLS season, and it would give Tottenham a chance to find out if Sonny’s still got the juice and is willing to sign a new contract to keep him at Spurs, or not.

We’ve vacillated wildly on the will-he-or-won’t-we spectrum over the past month or so, and I think that pendulum will continue to swing until we get a definitive idea of what Sonny wants to do. I suspect not even he knows that yet.

Apparently the new hotness for 2025-26 is to return to where you were loaned in 2024-25. Days after Alfie Dorrington returned to Aberdeen for the 2025-26 season, fellow Tottenham Hotspur defender Ashley Phillips is returning to Stoke City for next season’s campaign on a year-long loan.

Sure? Why not! Phillips is coming off of a season in which he made 35 starts in central defense for Stoke, playing 3000+ minutes in the second division. They quite like him out there in Stoke, and after spending a few preseason weeks at Spurs he must not be deemed quite ready for the rigors of Premier League football under Thomas Frank.

Phillips’ contract runs until 2028, so there’s no immediate rush. Another Championship loan might feel a little disappointing to some, but Phillips is only 19, and putting in those numbers in the Championship as a teenager is honestly pretty good. He’ll have another chance next season to improve and hopefully get into Tottenham’s first team, and if not he’s certainly done well enough on loan that Spurs will probably be able to flip him for a profit.

Probably no reason to give up on him quite yet, and if this season is anything like last season, he’ll be a key player again for the Potters. Stoke finished 18th in the table last season.

Phillips, Dorrington, Alejo Veliz, and Damola Ajayi are all out on loan this season for Spurs, while Josh Keeley was sold to Luton Town with a buy-back clause.

Friends, I’ve missed you all.

I woke up this morning to a glorious tweet that was sitting in the Carty Free writer’s room. It’s a tweet so beautiful and so hilarious, Dustin had to restore my writing privileges so I could make fun of it.

The good people over at Football Insider on the site formerly known as Twitter claim that Daniel Levy is planning to beat every other big club to the punch by signing Rodrygo. Normally I would say I wish I was making this up, but the tweet is just... chef’s kiss

Semi-related; whoever does the photoshops over at Football Insider needs to take a class because that kit looks terrible.

Anyway, I’m not sure I can put together a more amazing sentence than what they have in that tweet.

The tweet is stemming from an article that was posted yesterday by our old Bat Country merchants from years past, AS. While they’ll occasionally have some juicy news that actually sticks to the wall, this is completely off the rails. In typical Bat Country fashion, the article says absolutely nothing.

Where there’s room for two, there’s room for three. And if three fit, there’s room for four too. As the transfer window ticks down, Rodrygo Goes (Osasco, São Paulo, Brazil; 2001) has more suitors. As AS previously reported , Liverpool and Bayern Munich have entered the race for the Brazilian in practically interrelated deals. From London, and in addition to the (cold) interest from Arsenal and Chelsea , Tottenham wants to capitalize on the situation.

This is the hard-hitting journalism we strive to cover.

Wait, there’s more you say? Oh, maybe it’s not Bat Country after all!

After winning the Europa League almost two months ago, Spurs are looking to make a statement this transfer window . Thomas Frank took over the reins of the project following the dismissal of Ange Postecoglou. The Dane was promised one thing: “ investment and more investment .”

Okay, so basically you pulled a random quote from when Thomas Frank was hired and somehow manifested this into Tottenham are going to sign a wantaway Real Madrid player? Oh but we’ve already spent a lot, pending the completion of a sale for Morgan Gibbs-White once their owner stops throwing a tantrum. That has to be considered!

For now, they’ve already signed Mohammed Kudus (West Ham, €63 million), Morgan Gibbs-White (Nottingham Forest, €70 million), and exercised the purchase options on Mathys Tel (Bayern Munich, €35 million) and Kevin Danso (Lens, €25 million). In total, a net outlay of almost €200 million, in which they will try to include Rodrygo. Of course, they won’t go crazy. Given the good relationship between the two institutions, Daniel Levy will try to lower the Brazilian’s price to below €90 million.

Ah yes, through the power of friendship, Daniel Levy will convince Real Madrid to sell him for roughly £78 million. This is a real thing that is actually happening and we can take it to the bank.

Alright, snark aside, let’s actually break this down because Spurs are not signing Rodrygo.

The reports that come from actual journalists are that Rodrygo is currently making 200k/week net. If he’s going to leave Real Madrid, that number will go higher. His camp apparently wants to double that, but I’m not sure I believe that’s correct. There were more concrete reports that I cannot find now which suggested that the number was around 300k/week net, so he’s looking for a 50% increase on his wages to leave Madrid. That sounds more realistic, but it also limits the clubs that can afford him down to a very small number.

The bottom line is this: Spurs aren’t in this. This is 100% agent yapping to stir things up and if Madrid decide to cut him loose, I’d imagine we’ll see PSG, Liverpool and Bayern, get involved in an actual race for his signature.

Or, maybe I’m wrong, and Daniel Levy acquired the Heart Ring from Ma-Ti and became a Planeteer.

Well, this is a new one. This coming Saturday, Tottenham Hotspur will play not just one, but two preseason fixtures.

With a match against League One side Luton Town already scheduled on the books, Spurs announced via their website this morning a second match earlier the same day: a behind-closed-doors match against Wycombe Wanderers, also of League One.

From Spurs’ announcement, the idea is to treat each match like a proper competitive fixture, with a different XI in each game starting and playing around 60-75 minutes. It’s something Spurs can do due to both their bloated squad and the relative talent of their youth; plus we still have guys like Bryan Gil kicking around!

A number of talented players didn’t even see the pitch in the weekend against Reading, and that was with the likes of Archie Gray, Wilson Odobert, and Mathys Tel missing due to U21 international duty, and James Maddison, Radu Dragusin, and Dejan Kulusevski still working their way back from injury. It’s a BIG squad, and this is a good chance to both build fitness and give minutes to some of the fringe players to see what they can do.

Even better: though the match is behind-closed-doors, it will be streamed via SPURSPLAY. It’ll be a veritable feast of Spurs football!

Programming note: We are taking a one-day break from the hoddle hero for Ozzy Osbourne. The hoddle hero - Yves Bissouma - will return tomorrow.

I’m not sure what more I can say about Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath that is more insightful or impactful than what his family, bandmates and slate of legendary musicians have already shared.

One tribute I was particularly keen to look at was Queen guitarist Brian May, who inducted Black Sabbath into the UK Music Hall of Fame.

A few years ago I was record shopping in Connecticut. I don’t often seek out specific records, but there was one I was searching for that day: Master of Reality, by Black Sabbath.

I had never listened to it, but I was drawn to it. Was it the cover art, with its wavy words and purple lettering over Master? Was it the slight contrarian in me seeking that out over Paranoid (which I picked up on a later day)?

I flipped through the Black Sabbath bin, only to find it not there. I searched through every single new arrivals bin and flipped through hundreds of records, only to find it not there.

It was a surprisingly difficult find, as I later learnt that it’s been some time it would be reissued.

But as I was about to call it a day, my ears caught wind of the unmistakable sound of Black Sabbath playing in the shop.

Wouldn’t you know it, the record store owner took it out of the bin and was spinning it. I immediately went up to him and said, Dear Mr Record Store Owner, please may I purchase this copy of Master of Reality?

Of course he said yes. What luck!

I brought it home with me and spun it on my turntable. What I heard was something so bombastic and daring. It was sludge metal at its best.

There is so much to love here: the coughing fit at the start of Sweet Leaf, Geezer Butler’s bass riff bringing us out of After Forever, the hardcore drumming in Children of the Grave (oh yeah, Tony Iommi on guitar too), the structure of Into the Void. Even softer sounds like Orchid feel iconic.

It quickly catapulted into my all-time favourite albums list. And as I spin it tonight I try to go back to the first time I listened to it. It blew my freaking mind. It still does.

Fitzie’s track of the day: Master of Reality (in full), by Black Sabbath

(quick note - you’ll have to manually start it at 00:00. Or you can just start at Children of the Grave)

And now for your links:

Alasdair Gold: “Morgan Gibbs-White and the Tottenham winners and losers after Thomas Frank debut”

The Telegraph: “Yoane Wissa leaves Brentford training camp amid Newcastle and Spurs interest”

BBC: “‘Is this a movie?’ - England overcome odds to reach final”

The New York Times: “Ozzy Osbourne, the Lovable Prince of Darkness”

AP: “Ozzy Osbourne, who led Black Sabbath and became the godfather of heavy metal, dies at 76”