Kevin Danso spoke to reporters on Wednesday evening ahead of Tottenham Hotspur's Europa League round of 16 first leg tie at AZ Alkmaar and we've got a full transcript with everything the defender said.
The centre-back spoke about Cristian Romero and Micky van de Ven as well as playing alongside Archie Gray and what Ange Postecoglou told him when Spurs approached Lens to sign him in the winter window. He also spoke to football.london about why he is such a combative defender who Postecoglou said likes taking the hits from attackers.
Our Tottenham correspondent Alasdair Gold was among those at the AFAS Stadion putting the questions to Danso. Here's a full transcript with every word the Spurs centre-back said at the press conference in the Netherlands.
Now you're at Spurs, but you nearly went to Wolves?
I’m here now and I try not to think too much about what happened in the past. I can’t change that. I can’t do much about that. I think when a club like Spurs comes knocking, it’s something that I don’t think a lot of people would turn down. Certainly not me. That’s why I am here today.
Was playing in European football a big part of it?
Yeah, 100 per cent. I think Spurs is a big club and we have the chance to play in Europe. That is where Spurs belong. That is what we want to achieve every season, to continue adding to the history, hopefully with some trophies — that is what we are setting out to do. It starts tomorrow by coming out and trying to win the game.
Cristian Romero and Micky van de Ven are back, how do you find that competition? Are you excited by the challenge of competing with them for a place?
Was that competition part of the attraction of Spurs?
You seem to take a lot of hits, get up and limp a bit before getting on with it in games. Ange Postecoglou said the other week that you like taking the whacks, is that fair to say?
I like to think of myself as a warrior, just try to get my body in front of shots, block shots, just be an aggressive defender who's always trying to get in the way of stuff, stop the opposition from scoring, and getting whacks is part and parcel of that, but like you said, I just get up, limp a bit and continue.
Is that from something in your rugby background at school?
Probably, that and growing up with two brothers, always getting whacks from them, but like I said, I enjoy it, it's part of football, everybody gets a kick here and there, you just have to get up and keep going.
What have you made of Archie Gray?
Unbelievable, the fact that he's 18, the maturity he plays with, the maturity with which he carries himself in the dressing room, it's amazing, he's a great lad and his quality has been on show for many weeks now. I think he's just going to keep improving, because he's only 18 and to already have that maturity in the way he plays football, and off the pitch, it's something that's going to take him a long way.
Players always speak about the Ange Postecoglou chat that helped them sign for the club, what was yours like?
It didn’t take much for me to be honest. But it was really short and sweet - he just quickly gave me an insight about the idea of how he wants to play. It was very brief and he just told me the idea of what his team stands for. After that I was 100% sure.
Do you sense a hunger in the squad to win this trophy?
Do you feel this is your last chance to win something?
We take every game as an important one and go out to try and win every time. We’re only in the Europa League now and we’re going to go out and try and win. We want to win the competition of course because we want to be part of a Spurs team that is winning things. The pressure is normal and you have to deal with that at all big clubs - it's down to us to bring a good performance and win the game.
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