"I think, yeah, reinforcement. Like I said a while ago, we've been planning. A lot of it was going to be around where we're at around this time. Fair to say we're still a little bit short in a couple of areas and we need to reinforce. But January's trickier in terms of what sort of players you can bring in." Ange Postecoglou said.
Tottenham Hotspur have suffered a horrific injury crisis throughout the first half of the 2024/25 campaign, and at the time of writing, they are missing their first-choice goalkeeper and centre-backs, whilst their first-choice left-back and holding midfielder are not fully fit.
Add that to the fact they are missing important squad players like Richarlison and Wilson Odobert, they are not in a strong position at all in terms of competing across all four fronts, which they will have to do in January. At the moment, they are relying on the same core group. of 11/12 players to start every game, which is one reason cited for the lack of consistency in recent weeks.
However, one thing is for sure, the Australian will not entertain the signings of players who cannot help to improve the squad.
"For us, ideal — for any club, I guess — you want to bring in people who are going to make you stronger. I think the fact that, obviously, we're still in the Carabao Cup semi-final, still got Europe, FA Cup, we're in all the competitions, it's not like our schedule's going to ease up at any stage. So I think it makes sense. We will try and reinforce where and what number we'll have to wait and see."
When quizzed on not rushing into any emergency buys due to the sheer amount of injuries in the squad, Postecoglou admitted that would be the "balancing act."
Last January, Spurs moved quickly to bring Timo Werner in on an initial loan from RB Leipzig, and although the German did impress in the latter stages of the 2023/24 campaign, The Lilywhites opted to extend his loan deal and now this season he has been poor. The former Chelsea forward was publicly criticised by his manager after a 1-1 draw against Rangers in the UEFA Europa League and now appears to have fallen out of favour, despite still having another six months on his loan deal.
"You don’t just want to panic and bring in anybody that you don’t think will help our cause in the back half of the year, but I think we’ve already shown we are pretty methodical and prudent about our work. We’ll make sure we’ll bring somebody in who is going to help us," he added.
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Rodrigo returns
After a seven-game suspension, Tottenham will be over the moon to welcome Rodrigo Bentancur back for their away trip to Nottingham Forest on Boxing Day. The Uruguayan has been unable to feature in any domestic feature since the culmination of the international break but has featured in two Europa League games.
In his last appearance - a 1-1 draw with Rangers at Ibrox on December 12th - he was replaced on the hour mark, and despite impressive performances prior to his ban, he may not be able to come straight back into the midfield.
Postecoglou was keen to see his number 30 return to action but was wary that his fitness and match sharpness may not be up to scratch.
"Yeah, it's good to have him back. He's been working hard at training. In terms of Boxing Day, we'll see. But certainly just to have an extra body. I think what the players have had to deal with, the core group of players over the last sort of three weeks or so, has been very, very demanding on them. Most of them have got through it pretty well, in terms of not getting any more injuries, thankfully for us. But it'll be nice to have just some ability to rotate some players and even make substitutions in games that hopefully will help us."
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We're all human
"You're never critical of mistakes because mistakes are part of being a human being and being a footballer. So I'm not critical of mistakes at all. To me, it's about intent. It's about endeavour. If players are trying to do the right thing and it's not working out, you've just got to keep helping them," the former Celtic Manager explained when quizzed on how to achieve the balance between being proud of the players and ironing out mistakes.
"I can't be critical of this group of players at the moment in any sense. I think it would be unfair for anyone to because what they're doing is they're giving absolute maximum effort. That's backed up by the physical parameters you put against what they're doing. They're trying to do it in the way that I'm asking them to."
At the moment, and as has been the story for the past few weeks, Tottenham are without a host of first-teamers, all who would have had some contributing factor in one competition or another. The current injury list stands at a measly seven, whilst two others were missing for a period of time up until a week ago.
