Teddy Sheringham has revealed what business he thinks needs to be done at Tottenham during the upcoming January transfer window.
With just over a week until the window opens, Antonio Conte will have likely been working hard to assess the squad he has and figure out what incomings and outgoings he believes needs to happen, to lead Spurs to success.
It will then be a waiting game to see how much money he is given to do business with, from Daniel Levy and who Fabio Paratici will be able to recruit.
The Lilywhites are currently seventh in the league, six points off fourth place Arsenal, but with three games in hand over the top four sides.
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In the summer transfer window, Nuno Espirito Santo came in as the new Spurs head coach, as well as the five players who were signed – Bryan Gil, Emerson Royal, Cristian Romero, Pierluigi Gollini and Pape Matarr Sarr, with the latter being loaned back to his former club Metz.
All four signings who did make the move in the summer, to N17, have been given game time with Romero and Royal both breaking into the regular starting XI.
However, the Argentine is currently out with a serious injury and is not expected to return until early next year, which has been a blow for the Tottenham defence which the 23-year-old was slotting into well.
Royal has taken up the position of right wing-back in Conte’s favoured 3-4-3 formation, whilst Gil and Gollini have have had some match minutes, but aren’t regulars in the starting XI.
Although there have been improvements already seen under Conte, in his first couple of months in charge, it is still clear that there are a number of aspects that still need working on and this is likely to require fresh faces.
A back-up player up front is something that fans have been calling for, with Harry Kane being the only chosen striker, with 17-year-old Dane Scarlett still developing in the academy.
Creativity in the middle of the field has also been an issue, with the link between the defensive and offensive line struggling, since the departure of Christian Eriksen.
Romero’s arrival, before his injury, had already helped the back line but another one or even two centre backs could also be useful in helping Spurs made that step up in quality.
(Image: Photo by: 978bet)
In an exclusive interview with football.london, in association with 978bet, Sheringham revealed what business he believed Spurs needed to do in January.
“To give the whole club a massive lift, they could do with buying someone fantastic,” he admitted. “I’m not sure who that’s going to be.
“I think they need a central midfield player, a leader, someone that’s going to make sure everyone’s doing their jobs on the pitch because I don’t see enough of that at Tottenham. You need leaders on the pitch when things aren’t going so well. You need someone to dig deep and pull people around and make sure everybody’s doing their jobs, rather than looking after yourselves and that’s been a problem with Tottenham for a long time.
“They need to go out and make a statement, if they can find someone like a Roy Keane or a Patrick Vieira to come in and say ‘I was born to play in this position. I was born to play for this club and I’m going to show you how good I am and I’m going to drag everybody along with me’. There’s not too many of those players around and if they are, they’re going to cost a lot of money but for Tottenham to have an uplift, they need someone coming into the club like that,” Sheringham added.
Conte has already spoken about the Spurs team not being at this ‘high level’ so getting one or two solid signings could help give the Lilywhites this quality they need.
However, if Paratici decides to bring some new players in, it will be likely that some need to make way for these fresh faces.
The likes of Matt Doherty, Dele Alli and Harry Winks have all been amongst names who could make an exit from the club. However, the latter two in particular have produced decent performances in their last last couple of appearances and Sheringham doesn’t believe outgoings are as vital.
“It’s not the be all and end all for me because Conte won’t know everything about all his players yet,” the 55-year-old revealed. “He might see a little spark from someone and think ‘oh I didn’t expect that’, leave him in for a few more games and see if we can work on it.
“You go back to his time at Chelsea, he played [Victor] Moses. He was an outside left but he ended up playing him a right wing-back for a long time. I think he probably put him in there as stop gap for a game or two, found a position for him and he did ever so well for them. So you never know what you’re going to get from certain players if you ask them to do different jobs.”
Therefore, it will be even more interesting to see how the upcoming transfer window goes and Sheringham has praised Conte’s ability and how good it could be for Tottenham.
“I think [he’s] perfect for what Tottenham need at the moment,” the ex-Spurs forward said. “He demands 100% effort. I think Tottenham have fallen way below that over the last definitely six months, maybe even two years.”
Spurs’ next game is at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium against Crystal Palace, before a trip to Southampton’s Saint Mary’s Stadium two days later.
Conte will want his side to get maximum points from those two games as he makes his final assessments on his current players, before the January transfer window opens.