Want some good news? Everyone who played for Tottenham Hotspur in yesterday’s 3-2 loss to Galatasaray in the Europa League made it through unscathed and there are no new injury concerns for Ange Postecoglou’s men. However, according to the man himself, who posted his customary injury update video ahead of this weekend’s match vs. Ipswich Town, there are still four injured players who will not feature, and Cristian Romero is questionable.
“Yeah, look last night the brief I got after the game was everyone came through unscathed so there’s no issues from last night. Cristian, we’ll see how he goes the next couple of days, the idea is to try and get him out there and train and he’s pretty keen to so he has a chance for the weekend.
“Mikey [Moore] probably still not right for the weekend, and probably Timo [Werner] as well. Really out of the ones who are out, only Cristian could be back.”
So that’s Wilson Odobert, Richarlison, Timo Werner, Micky van de Ven, and Mikey Moore who are all out and will not feature against the (snicker) Tractor Boys. Mikey at least we know is due to a virus, the same one that ruled him out vs. Galatasaray yesterday. Timo is still dealing with his own injury, and Wilson Odobert is on the long-term injury list.\
The biggest bummer continues to be Richarlison, who had just returned from injury and was starting to round into form before he pulled his hamstring while assisting a goal last weekend. Postecoglou expounded a bit on Richy’s situation in his pre-match press conference.
“He was very disappointed. I think I said in the lead up, we tried to take a different approach, he worked awfully hard on his rehab but also his general fitness. He’d really trimmed down in terms of his conditioning. He was doing everything right, we eased him back into playing we didn’t want to overload him and unfortunately he broke down again.
“He’s disappointed but ultimately, we’ve just got to keep getting him back in there and work with him to get him back up because he’s an important player. You saw last week the impact he had coming off the bench and setting up the goal. Disappointing for him, disappointing for us because we haven’t really had him at our disposal this year. But we’ll just keep working with Richy and try to get him back.
“I’m reticent to put [a time on] it but he’ll be out for a significant amount of time. It’s a significant hamstring injury.”
Postecoglou also declined to put a timeline on Micky van de Ven’s return from a strained hamstring, but for the first time hinted that it might go beyond the upcoming international break.
“Yeah, it will be after the international break. When after will just dictate sort of his progress during that time. I think probably the end of the break will be four weeks, so when exactly after that we’ll have to wait and see.”
With Timo, Mikey, and Richarlison all out, it means Son Heung-Min will again be relied upon at the left forward position, with no real natural backup behind him. And based on his performance in Turkey yesterday and his own recent recovery from injury, it wouldn’t surprise me if Sonny doesn’t go the whole 90 on Sunday either. Postecoglou also suggested that the club is treating Son with kid gloves, making sure they don’t overtax him as he returns to fitness.
“For Sonny where obviously he had the injury we brought him back, he kind of had a relapse and what we don’t want to do is put him back into that cycle. It’s very easy to fall into that cycle by pushing players, particularly when they’re coming back from injury.
“Managing his minutes, building his up. He got a good 55 on the weekend, he got 45 last night. Yeah hopefully we can continue to build that up but ultimately for us its about getting him back and keeping him back because we cant afford any more injuries in that position.
“We’ve already got Wilson [Odebert] with a long-term injury, and we’ve got a Richy with long-term issue. We’ve got Mikey out, we cant afford to lose a player in that area of the park so, I’ll always make decisions that I think are best for the club and for what we’re trying to achieve.”
Tottenham host winless and newly-promoted Ipswich this Sunday at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. Kickoff time is 9 am ET / 2 pm UK. The match will be televised on USA Network in the States.
