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Mixed International Experiences Are Fuelling Tottenham Players in Different Ways
- Updated: October 8, 2016
Perhaps a little surprisingly, Tottenham Hotspur manager Mauricio Pochettino was not displeased with the timing of this current international break. Rather than rue an unwelcome halt to momentum sustained by their 2-0 win over league leaders Manchester City, he chose to look at the bigger picture.
“I think we are very happy it is the international break because we have time to recover some players like [Mousa] Dembele or Harry Kane, more time [for them] to arrive because we need all to compete,” Pochettino told his post-City press conference.
“We have ahead a lot of games, I think October and November are very tough months to compete, a lot of games, and we need all, I think. Now is good to rest a little bit.”
Then again, the Argentinian is not one to speak his mind too much. Rather than create some unhelpful headlines about the perpetual clashing of international and club football, he might just have decided it was better to keep schtum.
Of course, people are allowed to feel more than one way about something. The mixed experiences of Tottenham’s players with their various national teams in 2016 lends itself to such an attitude.
These days it may be easier to count the players at Tottenham who are not representing their country. Even several of their most-touted academy prospects are doing so at junior level. Indeed, some of the hype and hope surrounding players such as Marcus Edwards, Joshua Onomah and Harry Winks has come from exposure with England youth teams.
Edwards has impressed in tournaments with the Under-17s while Onomah actually was actually part of the team that won the 2014 European Championship in that age group. He has since been promoted to the Under-21 team, though did not feature in the Euro 2017 qualifier win over Kazakhstan. Winks captained the Under-20s in a game versus Canada earlier this year, earning plaudits for his performance.
Of the Tottenham senior squad these youngsters are endeavouring to break into, 11 were involved in this past summer’s European Championship. This was joint with Liverpool for the most of any Premier League club, with the participating Spurs players exceeding the Reds when it came to actual match time, per Press Association Sport (h/t Eurosport).
Moussa Sissoko, a France team-mate of one of those men, Hugo Lloris, has since joined the club. Christian Eriksen, Michel Vorm and another new signing in Vincent Janssen missed Euro 2016 after their nations—Denmark and the Netherlands—failed to qualify.
Elsewhere Erik Lamela was a losing finalist with Argentina in the Copa America and Heung-Min Son missed the start of the Premier League campaign representing South Korea at the Olympic Games. Victor Wanyama is a Kenya international and…you get the picture by now.
Spurs’ recent and current standing—title challengers last season, second in the league early in this campaign—is naturally informed by this calibre of player. But that there are pros and cons to having such talents has been seen in the ramifications of the greater profile and scrutiny their prominence brings.
The two sides are not always so entwined.
Lloris captaining the host nation at this past summer’s tournament was too big in its own right to have anything but the most tenuous relation to Spurs duties.
Less satisfaction in his day job might have made France’s final defeat to Portugal make him think twice about staying at a more lowly outfit. But his own optimism in the group put together by Pochettino is such that the two sides of his career can operate distinctly (for now anyway).
For the most part, however, one side does shape the other and vice …
