Tottenham Hotspur manager Ange Postecoglou confirmed the bad news of Kevin Danso’s injury today in his weekly press conference ahead of Spurs’ match against AZ Alkmaar in the Europa League. That bad news includes the revelation that Danso picked up a hamstring injury, adding himself to the list of Spurs players that have also suffered the same fate.
But there is good news — not only is Cuti Romero and Micky van de Ven back (if not full strength), but Ange also confirmed that Ben Davies is back in training and will be available to play tomorrow night in North London.
“Right, OK. I think you covered it all there! Yeah, Kevin got a hamstring injury in the last game so he is out. Ben [Davies] is back in, so that’s the only change from the weekend. Everyone else got through the game no problems.
“[Both Romero and Van de Ven] got through the game well. Obviously Romero no issues and it was great to get Micky back out there and he felt good. Both available.
“Hard to say at the moment [how bad Danso’s injury is]. He felt it right at the end of the game. We will see. We have got the international break which helps us. Kevin looks after himself, he is a pretty good athlete. We will give him every chance to get back. We have to let it settle down before we get clarity on it. He will be pushing for sure.”
Neither Micky nor Cuti were 90 minutes match fit and it’s difficult to believe either of them are now, just three days after the draw against Bournemouth. That said, with both of them back and both Ben Davies and Archie Gray available, it feels reasonable that, with a couple of subs, Spurs can cobble together a functional back line for not only this match, but also this weekend’s Premier League fixture against Fulham.
Tottenham’s promotional photos released today included a couple of Ange on the training pitch watching as Richarlison ran outside on grass, away from the rest of the first team. That implies that Richy still isn’t available for the upcoming two matches, and Postecoglou confirmed that he hopes to have Pombo back after the international break.
“Probably post the international break [Richarlison] should be there or thereabouts depending on his progress It was good to see him back out on the grass. He is working hard to get back in. Hopefully post international break he will be available.”
It goes without saying that tomorrow evening’s game is critical for Tottenham’s Europa League campaign, and Tottenham need at least a two goal lead to ensure progression to the quarterfinals (or a goal and a penalty shootout win). Ange didn’t get drawn into commenting on the must-win situation, but did state that the team is fully focused on producing a much better performance than they showed in the Netherlands last week.
“No, no extra pressure. I guess as I said before, I think we were obviously disappointed with our performance in the first leg and I guess the important thing is we didn’t make tie impossible for us to get back into. It is still very tight. Obviously they have the goal advance, but being at home and if we can play with the intensity and tempo we played at the weekend, I think we’ll have the opportunity to progress. Should we progress then we’ll obviously have another big challenge in the next round but right now the key focus is to put in a really strong performance at home tomorrow night and we’ll go from there.”
Should Spurs get past AZ tomorrow evening, they will face the winner of Eintracht Frankfurt vs. Ajax. Frankfurt have a 2-1 aggregate lead over Ajax after the first leg, with tomorrow’s match taking place in Germany.