The center of Tottenham Hotspur’s defense got a little more solid this week with the addition of Australian international Clare Hunt, who has joined from Paris Saint-Germain.
We are delighted to announce the signing of Clare Hunt from Paris Saint-Germain, subject to international clearance and work visa ✍️
Welcome to Tottenham, Clare!
— Tottenham Hotspur Women (@SpursWomen) August 16, 2024
Emma Sanders previously reported at the BBC that Hunt cost Spurs’ a transfer fee, but didn’t specify how big it was.
Spurs have clearly made it a priority this offseason to improve on the back line. Hunt’s signing follows left back Amanda Nilden making her loan move permanent and right back Ella Morris arriving from Southampton.
Hunt’s recent club stints make it difficult to evaluate her stats. Her FBRef page looks like every PSG (or Lyon) defender ever: Lots of green bars in the passing and attacking categories, lots of red ones in the ball-winning categories. D1F is ridiculously top-heavy; her team had a ton of the ball and she wasn’t under pressure a lot.
Her time at Western Sydney Wanderers in Australia is kind of the opposite of that. WSW were a bottom-half team and the A-League is quite transitional, so Hunt’s tackle and interception volume there is high.
If you’re much more used to thinking about whether or not transfers make sense in men’s football, what I’m about to say might sound completely ridiculous, but I promise it’s true. The best data set we have to evaluate Hunt’s fit for Spurs is probably the 2023 World Cup. She was on an Australia team that was good, but nowhere near the best at the tournament, and played a decent sample of 749 minutes.
According to StatsBomb, Hunt had 4.08 aerial wins per 90 and won 83% of her aerial challenges at the World Cup, a percentage in line with her PSG numbers. She wasn’t a high-volume tackler, but won 86% of the ones she went into.
Those aerial numbers suggest Hunt could be a big set piece threat, but that hasn’t been the case so far for Australia or PSG. She hasn’t scored for either, and hasn’t won a ton of headers on set pieces either. Maybe Spurs can figure out how to get more out of her in that area.
Hunt completed a really low 29% of her long balls on an Australia team that didn’t have Sam Kerr fit and was trying out various false 9s, but a very good 68% of her long balls on a PSG team that physically dominates most opponents, so I’d call the data on that skill extremely incomplete and inconclusive. She’s also played both left and right center back, and I believe her passing skill with her left foot is above average but not elite for a right-footer.
I don’t have access to any Olympics numbers, but Australia was uhh… bad. As a whole, the team was simply Not Good. We’re just gonna move on from that.
Overall, Hunt’s resume and statistical profile look like a solid fit for Tottenham, and she should improve the team’s defense.
Now can we sign a midfielder or two? Just a crumb of midfielder, please?
Hey, who’s this new writer, some of you may be asking. Well, I guess we didn’t do a new writer intro because I’m… kind of not? I founded this site in 2010, and fully handed the reigns over to Dustin in 2014. I contributed to the site sparingly after that until I left my job at Vox Media in 2020. I worked at NWSL club Angel City FC for a couple years, and now I’m back to writing.
My full-time gig is over at The Transfer Flow, but I asked Dustin if I could write here again because I miss doing the silly, nerdy, and niche Tottenham-centric stuff that the general football audience doesn’t necessarily care about. I’m very happy that he welcomed me back. You’ll see me here as I have time/ideas that don’t conflict with the day job.
