Cartilage Free Captain

A month without Tottenham Hotspur football?

NOT SO FAST!

We have three preseason friendlies on the docket this month as Thomas Frank’s Tottenham begins to take shape. Who’ll be in the squad? Who knows.

What we do know is that Spurs are set to play against Reading on 19 July. Then they’ll be trading those comfy confines for a road trip to Luton Town before jetting off to Hong Kong at the end of the month.

According to the club, this will make the first time the North London Derby will be played outside the UK. Feels strange.

Here are the fixtures in bullet form:

At Reading, 19 July

At Luton Town, 26 July

Versus Arsenal (in Hong Kong)

In other Spurs-related news, the Champions League also kicks off again (sort of) with the first stage of the qualifying round.

But all this comes as we await first-team arrivals for the men’s squad. The links have come in a not-so-steady drip drip drip, but maybe by the end of this month we’ll get some more activity once Frank gets a better look at the squad.

There’s even less going on with the women’s squad. We still don’t have a manager. This’ll be the last season before the Women’s Super League expands from 12 to 14 teams in 2026-27.

Fitzie’s track of the day: Everybody Laughs, by David Byrne

And now for your links:

Matt Law: “Tottenham eye West Ham’s Mohammed Kudus in end to unofficial ‘transfer embargo’ between rivals” (more on this from menno later)

Sky Sports: “Sheffield Wednesday: Wages not paid to majority of players and club staff for third month this year”

The Guardian: “From Russo to Katoto: six contenders to be top scorer at Euro 2025”

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but according to one source in Argentina, Tottenham Hotspur and Atletico Madrid have come to a “verbal agreement” for the transfer of Cristian Romero. The fee is reported between €55m-60m (£47m-51m). The article comes courtesy of Argentine journalist Fernando Czyz, whom I don’t know but who is apparently followed by Fabrizio Romano and Felipe Cardenas. Czyz calls it a “bombazo.”

Yeah, I’d say so. “Bombazo” indeed.

The report goes on to say that Tottenham’s asking price is €70m (£60m), and that Atletico already has Romero’s verbal agreement to join this summer. That said, it’s not a done deal and there’s a lot that could happen that could still tank this deal. Czyz suggests that Romero might put in a formal transfer request to speed things along.

I think we all saw this coming. There have been signs, going back to last season - small comments, minor micro-agressions, Cuti seemingly prioritizing international duty over Tottenham. And he reportedly was not happy with the sacking of Ange Postecoglou, with whom he had a good relationship.

Czyz suggests that if the Romero deal doesn’t go through for whatever reason, Atletico will turn to Piero Hincapie, whom honestly would make a pretty fantastic Cuti Romero replacement at Tottenham Hotspur — Johan Lange should maybe take a look at that guy. If Romero does leave, Kevin Danso would step into Cuti’s role alongside Micky van de Ven if they don’t make another defensive purchase. That’s probably okay. Danso isn’t Cuti Romero, but honestly nobody is, and Danso can capably fill that role if required. The bigger issue is if Micky continues to get injured — I have a lot less confidence in Danso if he’s lining up beside Radu Dragusin.

I would’ve wanted closer to £60m for Cuti (assuming, y’know, this happens) but you don’t always get what you want in football. All that said, despite the “bombazo” language this doesn’t feel like it’s anything close to done deal... though now it’s starting to feel like a fait accompli.

Welcome everyone to another edition of Your EFL Championship roundup, where hoddle headquarters takes a look at what’s going on in England’s second tier.

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We have to talk about Sheffield Wednesday.

While there may not have been any matches this month, Wednesday’s future in the second tier - and perhaps even in the English system altogether - is in serious peril.

Sheffield Wednesday must pay their players’ today. The deadline comes after the English Football League had already hit Wednesday with a spending ban until January 2027 after the club had “[exceeded] 30 days of late payments”. Wednesday are appealing the decision.

Wednesday and its chairman Dejphon Chansiri were separately charged of non-payment of player wages in March and May this year.

The Guardian reported that some players still have not received their wages, and players could give notice of their intention to terminate their contracts.

This all comes as manager Danny Rohl’s future remains up in the air. The Independent (via MSN) reported that Rohl is currently in talks about leavin the club. It would be a such a shame for him to leave considering how well he did to tidy things up at Hillsborough.

But when your staff aren’t getting paid and you face a transfer window ban because of your owner, then you have every right to head for the door.

In a lengthy (and bewildering) statement this week, Chansiri rejected two offers from a US consortium buying the club.

“The second offer was £40m plus limited future Premier League promotion payments – far from a guaranteed $75m which was reported in the second media interview.”

But how seriously is he about engaging in discussions to sell?

That’s one of many questions that need to be answered. But none are more important than if the club is able to pay wages this month. What happens after that? Who knows.

Fitzie’s track of the day: Drop me off in Harlem, by Sun Ra

And now for your links:

Alasdair Gold: “Tottenham’s ‘Neymar-like’ wonderkid offered new contract amid negotiations”

The Guardian: “Harry Kane sinks Flamengo to set up Bayern Munich’s Club World Cup tie with PSG”

ESPN: “USMNT beats Costa Rica in shootout to reach Gold Cup semis

Do you know how quiet it is out there on the transfer front? There’s been, like, almost zero news and most of the rumors are dumb. Makes it difficult to write about stuff, even more so because I’m set for a little time off from the blog here in the next week for another cancer-related medical procedure. But let’s talk about one iffy rumor anyway.

Alan Nixon, a sportswriter and journalist and ersthile of a periodical that we will not name because it sucks, is nonetheless at times strangely reliable with the transfer rumors. Most of his good stuff he posts on his Patreon now, which I will not subscribe to. Nevertheless, there’s a new rumor out (via Football League World) that says Sheffield United are interested in making a permanent move for Tottenham Hotspur’s 20-year old central defender Ashley Phillips.

Ash hasn’t cracked the first team at Spurs yet but has had a couple of successful loans in the Championship. He’s coming off of a good loan last season with Stoke, and Sheffield United — who recently dumped Chris Wilder for Ruben Selles — would like to make him one of their key offseason additions.

Tottenham reportedly rate Phillips at £6m, but the report suggests that Thomas Frank isn’t willing to sell, because Frank wants him as part of next year’s squad. Now, there’s some wiggle room in that statement — unless you count tape, Frank hasn’t actually seen Ash play. That said, it’s not at all surprising that Frank might want to keep Phillips around in preseason to run him through his paces and see if he’s ready to make the step up to Premier League level. If Spurs are rebuffing purchase offers for him, that suggests that at minimum Frank wants to keep him around for preseason, and likely for the tour to Asia.

Now does that mean that Phillips is in Frank’s first team plans. Absolutely not (although... maybe?). I can certainly see a situation where he’d be loaned back out to the Championship again if it doesn’t seem he’s quite ready yet. He’s only 20, and you don’t see may 20-year old top level central defenders (the exception being Dean Huijsen, now at Real Madrid).

So stick a pin in this rumor for now. Tottenham clearly have no interest in selling him at the moment, even with a buy-back clause (something I think Spurs should do more of), but that doesn’t mean Ash Phillips won’t move somewhere else this summer. Let’s wait and see.

Alejo Veliz’s future at Tottenham Hotspur was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever, about that. Veliz was a young player essentially signed as a lottery ticket, and the thing about lottery tickets is that most of the time they don’t pan out. Veliz spent the last season and a half on loan at Sevilla and Espanyol and hasn’t exactly set the pitch on fire. At this point it’s probably best for everyone involved if he finds a new club.

Pursuant to that, Racing de Alma today posted a story on its official web page declaring that it has lodged an official bid of $5m (£3.6m) to bring Alejo back to Argentina. That’s obviously not a lot of money for a player for whom Spurs paid £13m to sign from Rosario Central in 2023, but the proposal also has a 30% sell-on clause, so Spurs will get a little bit back if and when he does end up moving to another club.

It’s unusual to see a football club actually post about making a bid for a player, especially when the deal hasn’t yet been agreed to. You certainly don’t see that in England, but maybe that’s a uniquely South American thing, or maybe this is one way a small Argentinian club can put a little pressure on one of the richest clubs in world football, I don’t know.

The Racing de Alma report also says that Rosario Central, Veliz’s old club, is also pushing to re-sign him, but they only want him on loan. For that reason, Racing thinks it’s likely they can get this over the line. That’d be fine with me. Veliz might not have worked out, but he’s still a young player and could end up having a perfectly fine career in South American football. We’ll see if this goes anywhere.

Tottenham Hotspur have sandwiched in another preseason match ahead of the 2025-26 Premier League campaign. According to Reading FC’s website and Tottenham’s social media channels, Spurs will travel to the Select Car Leasing Stadium to face the Royals on Saturday, July 19 for a 10 a.m. ET / 3 p.m. BST kick-off.

This is Spurs’ sixth match of the preseason, including the tour to Hong Kong and Korea, and the earliest warm-up match, taking place in just 22 days. Weirdly, unless Spurs schedule a seventh preseason fixture, this will be the first summer I can remember where Tottenham didn’t schedule a preseason match at their home ground. All of them are either away or at neutral stadiums outside of the UK. Feels a little weird to NOT give the fans a chance to see their team play before Spurs’ first match of the season against Burnley on August 16, but I’m sure they have their reasons.

Below is an updated preseason match schedule. Most of the preseason matches will be streamed on SpursPLAY; free-stream or TV options have not been released, if there are any.

Spurs Preseason Matches

@ Reading FC

Saturday, July 19, 10 am ET / 3 pm BST

Select Car Leasing Stadium, Reading

@ Luton Town

Saturday, July 26, 10 am ET / 3 pm BST

Kenilworth Road, Luton

vs. Arsenal

Thursday, July 31, 7:30 am ET / 12:30 pm BST

Kai Tak Stadium, Hong Kong

vs. Newcastle United

Coupang Play Series

Sunday, August 3, 7 am ET / 12 pm BST

Seoul World Cup Stadium, South Korea

@ Bayern Munich

Thursday, August 7, 8:30 am ET / 1:30 pm BST

Allianz Stadium, Munich, Germany

Great news everyone.

The world has decided that we haven’t had enough music biopics in the last decade, so they’re giving us another one.

The subject this time: Bruce Springsteen. THE BOSS.

Playing Bruce Springsteen will be up-and-coming actor / underwear model Jeremy Allen White. A true unknown in Hollywood, and we must thank our lucky stars there is a new breakout American star.

Here’s a list of some (but not all) biopics that have come out since Bohemian Rhapsody in 2018:

Rocketman (Elton John)

The Dirt (Motley Crue)

No Way Home (Bob Dylan)

Weird: The Al Yankovic Story (Al Yankovic)

Elvis (Elvis)

Back to Black (Amy Winehouse)

Bob Marley: One Love (Bob Marley)

Respect (Aretha Franklin)

Apparently there’s been one on David Bowie too that got a 19% on Rotten Tomatoes.

Here’s the thing. This biopic business is getting out of hand. It got out of hand a long, long time ago. I wasn’t certain on the Queen one, less so on Elton John. The Motley Crue film was bad and Amy Winehouse, Aretha Franklin, Bob Marley and David Bowie all came and went with nothing to show for it.

The only two to leave some mark were the Elvis and Bob Dylan biopics. The former was really long, even though Baz Lurhmann did what he does best. And the Bob Dylan film, I will concede, was a lot better than I thought it’d be.

But that doesn’t excuse us having yet another one coming down the pipeline. Do we even need to know Bruce Sprinsteen’s story? He literally wrote a book on it, set a Broadway show and then streamed it on Netflix.

So why do we need this. Who asked for this?

I’ll be skipping this one.

Fitzie’s track of the day: Born in the USA, by Bruce Springsteen

And now for your links:

BBC: “LAFC consider former Spurs manager Postecoglou”

The Athletic ($$): “Leeds striker Oliver Boast, 16, set to join Tottenham”

One year ago, Tottenham Hotspur managed to pry Archie Gray out of Leeds United, snaffling up a player who was considered basically Leeds royalty. According to the Athletic, they’re about to snap up another talented Leeds academy player.

Spurs are reportedly set to sign 16-year old Leeds United striker Oliver Boast to add to their development squad. Boast is considered one of the jewels of Leeds’ academy, much like Gray and his little brother Harry, also a Tottenham target. Boast apparently has not yet signed a professional contract with Leeds, so compensation is an issue — according to The Athletic, Spurs can either work directly with Leeds to find an equitable transfer fee, or a football tribunal will intervene and set the fee. But either way, it sounds certain that Boast will be joining Spurs this summer.

What kind of a player is Oliver Boast? Here’s one paragraph from The Athletic’s article that describes his style of play.

Those who have coached Boast at Thorp Arch describe him as a modern No 9, who can lead the line and can play as a lone striker. Boast’s speed has been described as one of his best attributes, as he runs off the shoulder of the last man and gets in behind opposition defences.

It’s important not to put the cart in front of the horse when it comes to young players. Football is littered with talented 16 year old footballers who don’t develop in the way they hope, or plateau at a level below that of the Premier League. That shouldn’t be considered a failure per se; developing a player and selling him to a League Two club is still a definite win for Tottenham’s academy, and players can have perfectly solid professional football careers even if they don’t crack Spurs’ first team. Look at someone like Troy Parrott, once one of the more exciting 16 year olds in Tottenham’s academy — he’s doing fantastic in the Eredivisie even if he never quite got to the point where he was an option for Spurs.

Anyway, this is a continuation of Tottenham’s focus on finding, signing, and developing young talent. Spurs should be making a couple of these signings every window, as far as I’m concerned. And if we’re lucky, in a few years we’ll all be able to brag about Boast.

After what seems like months of leaks and accidental kit sales here, there, and everywhere, Tottenham Hotspur have officially announced their away kit for next season - and it’s a thing of beauty:

Obligatory Krennic reaction gif:

I am a huge fan of this kit, and it’s probably my favorite for some time. Maybe it’s because I’m a New Zealand rugby fan, but the black just screams performance to me. The simplicity isn’t boring either, with a clean grey pinstripe pattern offsetting the monochrome look - consisting not just of simple lines, but Spurs iconography.

Some might find it boring; I think it’s classy. That said, maybe the less said about the “In darkness we dare” marketing campaign, the better (the embrace of Guglielmo Vicario’s nickname aside).

The new strip is available now through the Spurs website; feel free to sound off in the comments as to your thoughts! As for me, I’m gonna go order myself a Bergvall one.

I don’t know about where you live, but it’s getting pretty dang hot here.

The temperature in Washington on Wednesday reach 99F (that’s 37C) before taking into accoutn the humidity/head index. And for those of you that know, DC humidity is suffocating. I remarked earlier today that running in these kinds of temperatures feels like breathing in water.

But it’s pretty hot everywhere, too.

According to my google search, it’s going to hit 77F (25C) in London on Thursday. That didn’t seem too bad, until I remembered air conditioning is less ubiquitous over there.

So be smart out in the heat. Here’s a few things fitzie likes to do:

Drink lots of water. Hydration is your best friend right now.

Shade is also a great friend to have these days. It can be difficult to find, like on the Anacostia River trail.

It’s okay to hit the treadmill. Your hoddler-in-chief relied on the machine on Tuesday because there wasn’t a chance in hell (which it might as well have been in DC) that he was going for a run outside Tuesday. Will he run outside Thursday? That’s TBD.

It’s also okay to run slower. It takes a lot more energy to run when certain temperatures hit. This is probably a tougher one for me to practice, to be honest.

I like to eat lots of fruits when temperatures get like this. Watermelon and pineapples, in particular, are two that I keep going back to.

Enjoy an ice cream every now and then - you deserve it!

Be patient and kind with others. No one is happy in this weather.

If you have any other tips for getting through this heat, do let us all know.

Fitzie’s track of the day: Lost in Space, by The Hobos

And now for your links:

Jack P-B ($$): “Tottenham Hotspur and another summer of change at the top. Is there more to come?”

Alasdair Gold: “Tottenham wonderkid in huge demand as Thomas Frank faces critical transfer decision”

BBC: “‘A sensible signing’ - Arsenal agree Norgaard deal”

ESPN: “Luka Modric agrees to sign for AC Milan after Club World Cup”