Cartilage Free Captain

Djed Spence is having a breakthrough season with Tottenham Hotspur this season. Since he broke into the first team this year during Spurs’ injury crisis he has established himself as not only a Premier League-caliber player, but also one of Tottenham’s best players by performance metrics.

It wasn’t always easy. Spence was acquired in 2022 during Antonio Conte’s tenure, and the irascible Italian essentially dismissed Spence’s signing, calling his acquisition “an investment of the club” and that Spence was “a club signing.” Djed made just six appearances for Spurs in the fall of 2022-23 for a total of 47 minutes before being sent out on loan to Rennes that January. Spence spent the following season, the first under Ange Postecoglou, out on loan at Leeds and Genoa before returning and impressing in offseason this summer.

In comments made on Rio Ferdinand’s podcast and printed in the Standard, Spence has said Conte’s comments “shattered his confidence,” stating that despite being brought in as a promising young player fresh off winning promotion with Nottingham Forest, he was made to feel marginalized and unwanted.

“It wasn’t a nice feeling. Especially as I was coming to the club on a high, I was confident, I was buzzing, had just won promotion. Then it was like running into a brick wall. It shattered my confidence a bit, obviously I’m young. It’s not nice to hear.

“I knew it was rubbish at the time. It wasn’t a nice feeling. I was even going into the club like [puffs out cheeks] and, ‘What am I doing?’ I feel like whatever I did, that man [Conte] wasn’t happy about anything. Even if you did the right things, you were like, ‘Did I do the right thing?’ Cos he’s not really a complimenting guy.

“It gets to a point where you don’t really need validation from a coach. You just go, ‘Oh’.

“I probably had one conversation with him.”

Hindsight is always 20/20, and I confess at the time that while I was not overly thrilled with Conte’s comments about Spence, Djed had something of a reputation as an immature player who could be a little difficult to deal with. That said, it was absolutely a dick move by Conte to publicly bin off a new signing and make him feel unwanted. In the pantheon of Spurs Managers Being Jerks Moments during the tenure of my fandom, Conte’s comments about Spence ranks up there alongside Tim Sherwood, who when asked about Erik Lamela’s English, responded with a dismissive “Que?”.

That said, Spence also doesn’t think he necessarily got a fair shake under Big Ange at first either.

“When a new manager comes in you think, ‘Alright, everyone’s going to get a fair chance, he’s going to have a look at everyone’. With me, I don’t think that was really the case. But that’s part of the game of the game of football. Football’s not fair. [Postecoglou] just said basically I need to go out and play and that’s when I ended up going to Leeds.

“Sometimes you might not get a chance that you feel like you deserve. I’ve always known I was good enough. People say, ‘It’s good to see he’s got a second chance and he’s doing well’. I never really got the first chance. This is my first chance and I’m taking it. I’m just happy I worked hard, I stayed consistent and I was ready.”

Now, there’s a big difference between Postecoglou telling him “You need to go and play football somewhere on loan this year” and Conte basically saying “I don’t want or need this guy.” Postecoglou may not have been convinced about Spence’s fit in his team — a perfectly reasonable assumption based on his recent history at the club — but Ange at least gave Spence an opportunity to establish himself and his confidence on loan, which paid off significantly.

Importantly, Djed says that part of the reason it took him this long to get a foothold at Spurs was due to his own actions, saying that he was a little intimidated by the situation and didn’t “express [himself]” enough.

“I think I’ve been a victim of being too humble. Thinking things are just going to happen by not doing nothing and not saying nothing. But sometimes you have to express yourself.

“In my first year at Tottenham, I feel I gave a bit too much respect to the players and the surroundings, because it’s Tottenham. I came from Forest, I’m going to the Premier League, a top-six club, and I thought, ‘Phew, this is big’. I feel I gave them too much respect in regards I didn’t really be myself.

“When I went there, I saw players who were big names like Harry Kane and Sonny [Heung-min Son], and I didn’t want to step on anyone’s toes. But that was probably my biggest mistake, doing that and not expressing myself how I should have. I’d say this season [that’s changed]. I’ve got no time to waste now. I’ve got to go get it, it’s time.”

This is the first time we’ve really heard Spence’s side of the story, and I’m glad that he spoke up about his own feelings. That doesn’t necessarily negate the earlier reports of him being, at times, a little surly at past clubs and on loan, but does add some very important context to the whole situation. And, more importantly, add significant evidence that Conte was just a raging a-hole. Good riddance.

A few weeks ago we reported on a story that Tottenham Hotspur had started talks to potentially offer midfielder Rodrigo Bentancur a new contract to keep him here past the end of this current deal, which runs to the end of the 2025-26 season. Now, it sounds like the reports of Bentancur’s renewal might have been a little hasty. There’s a new report from Matteo Moretto that suggests Bentancur might be of interest to Atletico Madrid this summer.

The report is in Spanish and doesn’t have a ton of information, and in fact comprises a single paragraph in what looks like a rumor roundup. But it does state that the 27 year old midfielder

One of the footballers that Atlético has recently asked about is the Uruguayan of Tottenham Rodrigo Bentancur. The former Juventus player is 27 and has played 32 games in all competitions in the Spurs jersey this year. At the moment I cannot say that there is a real negotiation between the parties because it is still early, but Atletico has had contacts to test the ground for June.

— Matteo Moretto, Relevo

That’s not a ton to go on, obviously, but it does bring up the possibility that Spurs might opt to push for two central midfielders this summer as they continue their rebuild under Ange Postecoglou. Bentancur’s performances have been um let’s just call it “mixed” this season, and he really hasn’t looked like the same player since returning from a major injury last season. Bentancur is asked to cover a lot of ground in Ange’s system, and he’s shown that either he’s not particularly suited to that role or has had a physical decline that prevents him from excelling there consistently.

But Diego Simeone’s tactics seem like a much better fit for a limited, but still peak age, player. In fact, I can see Lolo doing well in La Liga if he’s playing a simplified game that doesn’t ask so much of him.

Consider this the last post about college basketball until much later this year, at the earliest

Oh, how futile hope is against the impregnable barrier of reality.

On Saturday, your hoddler-in-chief’s St John’s University were knocked out of the NCAAM basketball tournament. Thus crushing fitzie’s hopes and dreams and many Long Islanders’.

Let’s just take a moment though to recognise how tragic the referereeing was in this game: 44!

How is it possible to have a basketball game when there are 44 fouls? A fair amount of them (on both sides) were ridiculous too. I don’t think people tune into March Madness to see Zvonimir Ivisic or Kadary Richmond foul out of the game less than 10 minutes into the second half.

Horrific, Sissokoan refereeing.

That said, you’re not going to win a game when you’re shooting maybe 28%. Or if you’re shooting 9% from 3.

And now St John’s magicial season is over. Rick Pitino heads back to Queens, New York, with a Big East regular season and conference tournament title, but a disappointing R32 exit.

There’s not much to do now that the tournament is pretty much over. I might catch a couple of games here and there, but it hurts to watch the sport right now.

Fitzie’s track of the day: L’éléphant, by Henry Texier

And now for your links:

Jay Harris ($$): “Michel Vorm on Spurs under Pochettino, Vicario’s ‘ridiculous reflexes’ and captain Son”

Guardian ($$): “Scotland relegated in Nations League as Karetsas leads Greece demolition job”

You might or might not remember this, but Tottenham Hotspur sold Harry Kane to Bayern Munich last summer. It was a whole thing. And since that transfer, Kane has unsurprisingly upped his game to become quite possibly the most prolific scorer in world football, with 57 goals in 54 games, a scoring record that could put him in contention for the Ballon d’Or this coming year.

Yeah, he’s still pretty good.

It’s a slow news week what with the international break going on and all, and Kane has been speaking to the media while on England duty, so let’s talk about Harry Kane. In a recent media interview ahead of England’s World Cup qualifying match against Albania later today, Kane says that his move to Bayern has been a positive step in his development, and that moving to Germany has resulted in his “aura” being increased.

Harry Kane, hippie transcendentalist. Here’s the full quote.

“Just being at a club like Bayern Munich has helped push me on even more, confidence-wise and responsibility-wise. I feel like I’ve definitely got better, I’ve improved, and maybe the ‘aura’ of me as a player is a bit more respected than what it has been in the past, because you’re playing in big games, big nights.

“That’s probably what I mean in terms of being respected more worldwide, on the bigger stage. For something like that, you have to win enough team trophies to be considered in that and probably score 40-odd goals, but that is a possibility this season.”

Now, this is a Tottenham blog and the people reading it are mostly Tottenham fans. And yes, there has already been a little grumbling about this quote potentially denigrating Tottenham Hotspur, which developed him through the academy and turned him into a global superstar. So I suppose I can understand fans getting a little grumpy alluding to his current club as superior to his development to his (unnamed) past club.

But honestly, I think he says it quite fairly here. Bayern Munich is one of the biggest and best clubs in world football. It’s the reason Kane wanted to leave in the first place — he wanted to both win trophies (something he ironically has yet to do in his second year at Bayern) and also test himself at the very highest level of the game. He’s done that. He just did it in a way that indirectly annoyed Spurs fans.

Now I can chuckle a bit about his use of the word “aura” which sounds like something a Zoomer teen would say while arranging quartz crystals in their bedroom and not a 30-year old professional footballer. But it’s hard to argue with the fact that since leaving for Germany Kane has upped his game. I don’t know if he’ll win the Ballon d’Or, but I think he’d definitely deserve it. And it still kind of smarts.

Basically it’s this meme (thanks to Frinkiac.com):

God, I’m bored. I hope Spurs do something worth writing about soon.

Good morning and welcome to a mini recap from Day 1 of March Madness. Really, this is just a post to write about St John’s basketball. This hoddle has unofficially become a St John’s hoddle.

We’re now on Day 2 of March Madness, the second day of the annual college basketball tournament. Is there no better way to spend the day then back-to-back-to-back-to-back college ball games?

Of course, we start with your hoddler-in-chief’s St John’s University (2 seed), who overcame a slow start to take down 5-seed Omaha 83-53.

I’m happy St John’s survived and advanced, but there are a couple worries. Chief among those were too many fouls in the first half and a slow start.

But St John’s also always come out swining in the second half. Thursday night was no different, outscoring Omaha 50-25.

Big East player of the year RJ Luis Jr led the team with 22 points and 8 rebounds.

What awaits St John’s in the second round? Ten-seed Arkansas and John Calipari, setting up a hell of a match between two legendary college coaches. Tip off is Saturday.

Elsewhere, we got two nice upsets with #11 Drake taking down #6 Mizzou in the West region and #12 McNeese holding off the ACC’s #5 Clemson in the Midwest.

Let’s take a look at the rest of the scores:

South Region:

West Region:

East Region:

Midwest Region:

Fitzie’s track of the day: Oh Well, by HAIM

And now for your links:

Dan KP: “Tottenham: The key issues Ange Postecoglou must address before Eintracht Frankfurt showdown”

The Athletic ($$): “Mason Melia, Michael Noonan, Christopher Atherton: Is something happening with Irish boys?”

BBC: “England captain Kane feels he is ‘taken for granted’”

Happy Thursday, y’all. Most of you are probably glued to your screens (or the iPads under your desks) watching the first round of the NCAA tournament, and fair enough — it’s the international break and that means little to no actual news or matches to talk about for the next week and a half.

So why not a transfer rumor from a dubious source? Well, I got you fam. There’s an article out in AfricaFoot that Tottenham Hotspur have made an approach to Wolves for 23-year old Algerian fullback Rayan Aït-Nouri.

Now look, I don’t really know how to evaluate the efficacy of transfer rumors that originate in [checks notes] AfricaFoot. It certainly isn’t up there with The Guardian or BBC. That said, I quite like Rayan Aït-Nouri, think he’s a good player, would be open to seeing this happen, and it’s a slow news week so damn the torpedoes, we’re writing it up!

You might have heard this, but Tottenham are in the market for a dribbly left back to complement Destiny Udogie and Djed Spence, and Aït-Nouri would fit the bill pretty dang well. The Algerian international is one of Wolves’ best players, his skill set leads me to think that he’d do well in an inverted fullback system, and his dribbling ability could pair well with Son Heung-Min or Wilson Odobert on the left flank. He’s not the best at progressive passing, but he retains the ball very well and is not afraid to take on players in possession. He’s the definition of a complete fullback and at age 23 he’s in that sweet spot where he’s a quality player who still likely hasn’t hit his ceiling.

AfricaFoot says Spurs are the “most likely” (whatever that means) club to sign Aït-Nouri, but he’s attracting interest from Liverpool and (lol) West Ham. There’s no info on how much his transfer fee would be, but my guess is “stupid high.” He’s a real talent.

Is this a cromulent rumor? Look man, don’t ask me that right now. It’s a rumor about a good player linked to Tottenham Hotspur, and after this season I’ll take all the positive vibes I can get. And he’d be a pretty fantastic get, if you ask me.

Tottenham Hotspur is a club, as currently constructed, that is built for the future. Technical Director Johan Lange spent the past summer identifying and acquiring a host of young talent that, with luck, will develop into the next great Spurs first team players. And according to one list, they’ve done a pretty important job in finding those young talents.

Each year, Goal.com releases their NXGN list of what they consider the top 50 young players (aka “wonder-kids”) in world football. These are young players, usually teenagers, who have impressed for their clubs at a young age and are poised to potentially break out as future first team players. If you’re a Football Manager guy, this is a list of young players you might want to target for your teams. If you’re just a “youf-watcher” it’s also extremely interesting and possibly a glimpse of who might be the next stars in world football before they’re stars.

Tottenham Hotspur have five players on this list:

Yang Min-hyeok — #43

Luka Vuskovic — #26

Mikey Moore — #22

Lucas Bergvall — #16

Archie Gray — #13

To no one’s surprise, Barcelona’s young superstar Lamine Yamal heads up the list, but there are also names on it that Spurs have been linked to in current and past transfer windows, including Southampton’s Tyler Dibling, Brighton’s Stefanos Tzimas, and Olympiacos’ Charalampos Kostoulas.

Now, Spurs having five players on this list doesn’t mean that every one of them are going to end up as world-beaters. It only takes a quick google to find past versions of this list that include names that completely flamed out or plateaued under the top level of the game. That’s pretty par for the course when it comes to youth development — it’s a crap-shoot and excellence at youth football doesn’t always directly translate to excellence at senior level.

But holy smokes, it sure is nice to be recognized, isn’t it? Tottenham having five young players on that list is further reinforcement that Spurs are looking to build the NEXT great Tottenham squad even as they continue to transition and improve the current squad. And there’s many, many reasons to be excited about every one of those five players.

Tottenham Hotspur will almost certainly be in the market for a new central midfielder or two this summer, with special attention paid to a player who excels in the No. 6 role — a defensive mid who plays in the deepest midfield position. Spurs have already taken a step towards one signing in January when, as a condition of Giovani Lo Celo’s return to Betis, Tottenham received a purchase option of €25m with a right of first refusal for American-born midfielder Johnny Cardoso.

We wrote about Cardoso at the time, noting that reports also suggested if Spurs pass up the chance to sign him this summer, they’ll maintain a sell-on clause, something that at the time seemed very weird for a player Spurs don’t technically own.

There hasn’t been much news since, though now there’s a report from a couple days ago in Releveo that suggests Betis are already “resigned” to losing Johnny this summer, even if it’s not Spurs, and are preparing for life without him next season. Spurs are still the most likely option due to the purchase clause, and notes that Betis rejected a €18m bid from Wolverhampton Wanderers last January, along with other unknown clubs in England and Italy.

Interestingly, the report also states that despite the agreement with Spurs, Betis also gave Cardoso a new improved contract, just in case, to tempt him to either stay at Betis or push his value up even higher. Here’s the relevant paragraph, run through the Google machine:

However, the verdiblanco club awarded Johnny Cardoso with a contract improvement last January. The Betis wanted to recognize both the performance and the commitment exhibited by the midfielder, who had a low salary in the face of the importance he has acquired in the team. The leaders also wanted to keep a card under their sleeve in case the Tottenham did not finally exercise the purchase option, so it could raise a possible sale or even opt for the footballer to continue for another season.

I still think the most likely scenario is that Spurs opt to purchase Johnny this summer when his purchase clause kicks in — he’s been a little up and down this season at Betis but has also shown to have the potential to be a very good #6. But we won’t know until Spurs reach the end of the season and decide how they want to approach the transfer market this summer.

We’ve been waiting a long time for HAIM to release new music. Now, we’ve got it.

The sisters triumvirate released their newest single Relationships last week. It’s not the sound I typically associate with HAIM. The band adopts a more pop/R&B approach as opposed to that sultry SoCal soft rock sound.

As a song, it’s relatively forward: It’s about relationships.

More than that, it’s about a lot of unanswered questions surrounding their relationships after they end.

“Don’t they end up all the same

When there’s no one left to blame?”

“There’s a question.

Baby, how can I explain

When an innocent mistake

Turns into seventeen days? [Expletive] relationships”

And there’s another.

The song doesn’t quite serve to answer these questions, but instead chooses to sit in it. Which ya know, typically happens at the end of such things.

But what luck is it that HAIM released a new song right when the weather is turning, when spring is sprining. Few artists feel like warm weather and sun more than HAIM. and of course they deliver again with Relationships.

Is an album coming up next?

Fitzie’s track of the days: Relationships, by HAIM (NSFW for naughty words)

And now for your links:

Jay Harris ($$): “Analysing Archie Gray’s first start in midfield: A glimpse into Tottenham’s future?”

Alasdair Gold: “Eight players who have signed for Tottenham but haven’t played for the club yet”

The international break is here, like it or not, and that means a bunch of Tottenham Hotspur’s players are now off with their countries’ national teams. Which players? Well, that’s what this article is about.

A total of 14 Tottenham players were called up by their countries. Strangely, this Tottenham social media post only mentions 12 of them. The two omitted are in bold at the bottom of the list.

Son Heung-Min (South Korea)

Yves Bissouma (Mali)

Lucas Bergvall (Sweden)

Cuti Romero (Argentina)

Dominic Solankie (England)

Pedro Porro (Spain)

Brennan Johnson (Wales)

Ben Davies (Wales)

Rodrigo Bentancur (Uruguay)

Pape Matar Sarr (Senegal)

Guglielmo Vicario (Italy)

Destiny Udogie (Italy)

Yang Min-hyeok (South Korea)

Jamie Donley (Northern Ireland)

Why the official graphic omitted these two senior guys out on loan is beyond me, but I feel it’s important that they be included as well.

In addition to the senior call-ups, a number of Spurs’ youth and fringe players were called up to international U21 teams as well:

Dane Scarlett (England U21)

Archie Gray (England U21)

Mikey Moore (England U19)

Wilson Odobert (France U21)

Mathys Tel (France U21)

That’s a lot of Hotspurs away from training, and doesn’t include players recovering from injury like Dejan Kulusevski and Micky van de Ven! And actually, Van de Ven’s absence from the Netherlands senior team is weird; there’s a recent interview where Dutch manager Ronald Koeman addresses his absence, but it’s all in (duh) Dutch and I haven’t found a good translation yet.

At any rate, we’ll at least have a viewing interest in a few of the international matches over the next two weeks, should anyone decide to watch them.