Ndombélé - Keep or sell

The lack of understand of podcasters, Youtubers, copy and paste Twitter users and fnas is highlighted at a time like this.

Unprecedented times.

When the pandemic hit, I talked about pre-season and when football was allowed again, the need for 2 months of training to get the players fit enough to start a season.

They have had three weeks and for some of that time could only work in groups of five.

They are not match fit.

They are fit,but need to play matches to develop the core fitness in match intensity.

The players are currently in pre-season mode.

That effectively is what the last two games have been, even though they were competitive with points at stake.

A podcaster says he gives up because someone commented that Dele looked sharp tonight.

This was Dele's first "pre-season" game to get him fit, hence the reason he came off. Mourinho was constantly talking to the players.

He was sending messages to players,are you OK, can you continue. Players gave what they could, Lo Celso wanted to stay on as did Harry Kane.

Harry Kane wanted to play 3 of the 30 minute practice shifts against Norwich City, equal to 90 minutes, he was the only player that did.

What does that tell you about the mentality of Harry Kane, do whatever it takes to get to the highest level as fast as possible.

Mark Noble was taken off for West Ham, he is the modern day Mr West Ham, the modern day Billy Bonds or Bobby Moore.  Oh for the days when players stayed at clubs for a career, football over money.

Noble gives everything for their cause and has done for years. He would have run all day for them if he could but no, he had to be substituted, his body wasn't ready for a full 90 minutes at match intensity.

How many of these self-professed experts have taken that into consideration?

If their tweets are anything to go by, none and yet these people want to tell you what to think. They don't even understand the game themselves!

Lamela had a hand in our second goal, therefore he should start.

Lamela did nothing but balls up against United in his first game trying to get some match fitness, if you take out his hard graft defensively.

Dele is where Lamela was against United, he is behind him in terms of match fitness. 

Dele was making lots of runs into the box, the ball wasn't finding him, but he was there.

Some question his flicks as being pointless, they are a part of being something different. When he flicks come off they can lead to goals.

The attacking third is where sometimes you have to try something different, you have to try the difficult ball, you have to try flicks to open a team up and create.

Take that away and you take away creativity and then the very same fans cry we have no creativity!

One has to despair over our fans at times.

Now regular readers know me, I don't follow the press path as everyone else does, I plough my own furrow and I have done so over Eric Dier and Tanguy Ndombélé.

Eric Dier, simply because journalists and supporters don't like his performances, say he is for sale. The Times wrote he was one of four players we were looking to sell which was complete nonsense as you can now all see.

The contract extension discussions I spoke of are now common knowledge and the fact that he has played the last two game in central defence shows you that he is going nowhere.

He is the cornerstone of our defence for the future and it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if he were not made Spurs captain in the future.

He is the modern day Graham Roberts, the modern day Gary Mabbutt.

Right onto Tanguy Ndombélé.

Despite others telling you the contrary, I have emphasised that Tottenham are in negotiations with Barcelona over a deal for the French midfielder, that will allow us to bring one or more of their players to White Hart Lane.

Barcelona have been in constant contact with the entourage of the 23-year-old (24 in December) which could be one reason why his head has not been at Spurs.

Indeed, I wrote that the deal would possibly allow us to bring in two or three Barcelona players to cover his full cost.

L'Equipe are now reporting that Spurs are in negotiations with Barcelona!

Barcelona have no money, they are desperate to get players off their books, it frees up wages for someone else at the very least.

Coutinho is top of their list to get rid of and they want something finalised by the end of the month if possible.

Don't get me wrong, Tottenham are not definitely selling Ndombélé, but if the right offer comes along that allows us to strength central midfield and perhaps right-back, then we are going to look at it.

Do we think he is a good player? Yes we do.
Do we think he has potential? Yes we do.

But, the stumbling block is his mentality, he has a lazy "divine right" mentality that isn't conducive to the Premier League. Etienne Capoue had the same attitude problem that he later admitted was his fault and not that of Spurs.

Do you wait until he realizes that, if he ever does or sell him and move on?

We want Pierre-Emile Højbjerg, that is no secret.

Currently we are not cash rich and Southampton';s price tag is unrealistic.

Could we see a loan with option to buy that becomes mandatory with certain easy conditions met for Ndombélé with Barcelona, that allows a cash plus players deal with Southampton for Højbjerg?

Or even a loan deal with mandatory purchase clause in a year plus fringe players.

Kyle Walker-Peters, Luke Amos, Juan Foyth, Cameron Carter-Vickers, Danny Rose, Serge Aurier could all be included in any deal for the ex-Saints skipper.

We have obviously discussed with Southampton which players they would be interested in.

They don't want to lose him in a year for nothing so they have to come to a deal at a more realistic price, just as we had to for Eriksen.

The other option is that we loan Coutinho from Barcelona, with Barca paying some of his wages with an option to buy at a set price and the price on the unwanted Brazilian is dropping all the time.

Or, are there several other players, Nélson Semedo for instance or Ousmane Dembélé, another Frenchman with an attitude problem they are desperate to get rid of. Samuel Umtiti, Riqui Puig, Ivan Rakitić or any others who have caught our eye.

It is reported in Spain that the Spanish champions are willing to include both 26-year-old (27 in September) Umtiti and 26-year-old (27 in November) Semedo in a deal.

It is not certain that we will sell Ndombélé, but it is not certain that we will keep him either.

If selling him allows us to bring in others to improve the squad, then so be it.

Liverpool sold Philippe Coutinho to improve the squad and look where they are.

PSG, Bayern Munich and Manchester United are all interested in him too.

My view, Ndombélé. will leave at the end of the season. I don't think his head is at Tottenham and if that is the case then there is no point keeping him and he won't play much more for us.

That's all for now so check out the links below.

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