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It is a truly testing time for Tottenham Hotspur right now, with Ange Postecoglou’s future in real doubt and the Australian relying on a good run in the Europa League to restore faith in his position.

Tottenham face change of manager and losing key players this summer

Spurs take on Eintracht Frankfurt over two legs which will define Postecoglou’s position, according to credible media sources like Fabrizio Romano, and anything less than impressive is highly likely to result in the Australian’s eventual dismissal.

Tottenham tipped to hire "perfect" Iraola alternative with "3 month" claim made

Spurs are in the market for a new manager.

ByEmilio Galantini Apr 8, 2025

Postecoglou’s tenure has been called “irreparable” by some, regardless of their campaign in Europe, and Postecoglou even admitted in a press conference this week that he’s aware of the rhetoric surrounding his position.

Wolves (away)

April 13th

Nottingham Forest (home)

April 21st

Liverpool (away)

April 27th

West Ham (away)

May 3rd

Crystal Palace (home)

May 10th

The Lilywhites are on course for their worst Premier League season, currently sitting 14th in the table after 16 top-flight losses, which is a real crash back down to Earth for Postecoglou after he recorded the best ever start by a new manager in the competition’s history last season.

Their on-field troubles and lack of stability under Postecoglou are also resulting in star players being linked with moves away from N17, including defender Cristian Romero, who is attracting serious interest from Atletico Madrid ahead of the summer window (Sky Sports).

Tottenham are believed to be targeting Atalanta’s Isak Hien as a potential replacement for the Argentine already, but he isn’t the only one who could end up departing.

It has also been revealed that Man City are now displaying an interest in star left-back Destiny Udogie, which will surely be a worry for Spurs given the pull of Eastlands.

As the threat of players jumping ship looms large, Tottenham midfielder Pape Sarr has revealed that he nearly made an exit of his own.

Pape Sarr makes Tottenham exit admission after nearly finalised deal

The Senegalese, in an interview with D Sports, claims that it very nearly happened during Antonio Conte’s tenure.

Sarr admitted he packed his bags and nearly left Tottenham, but an injury to Oliver Skipp prompted Conte to perform a full U-turn over letting him depart on loan.

“I was about to go on loan to Italy,” said Sarr.

“Everything was almost established, but the week before the finalisation, I remember that we were holding an opposition between us. I was a substitute with Ndombele.

“That moment, I was so excited, I wanted to show all my talents. Two days later, Skipp injured himself in training, and I replaced him. After the match, it was Conte himself who called me and said, ‘You’re not going to go on loan, I’m counting on you, you’re going to stay’.

“I had already packed my bags, and I called my dad and my agent, because they had already made the trip. At first, I was a little dubious, because I knew I was not going to play, but I thought that, once I had the opportunity, I would show up. At first, being one of the 20 players selected for the game was a real challenge for me.”

Since then, the 22-year-old has become a mainstay for Tottenham. He dazzled next to Yves Bissouma at points last term, and has been equally useful for Postecoglou this campaign – bagging six goals and three assists across 44 appearances in all competitions.

Seven-wicket haul sets up hosts only for familiar batting failures to hand back initiative

Alex Malcolm21-Nov-20252:46

Starc: My role is to be aggressive, take wickets

On any other day Mitchell Starc would have been the lone shining star.A wicket in the first over of an Ashes series, again. A career-best 7 for 58 to destroy England, again. His second career-best figures in as many Test bowling innings. His 100th wicket in Ashes cricket. Two stunning deliveries to remove Test cricket’s second-highest scorer for a seven-ball duck and England’s talismanic captain for just 6. His 17th Test five-for, his fifth against England to bowl the visitors out for 172 in 32.5 frantic overs after they had elected to bat.But when he stood in front of the media at 6.20pm local time, his bowling performance felt like it took place a week ago after an Ashes record 19 wickets had fallen. He was instead left to lament a carbon copy collapse to the one Australia experienced 12 months ago on the same ground against India, answer questions on Usman Khawaja’s fitness, and contemplate the prospect of having to carry his team on his shoulders with the ball again day two after a short turnaround.”[The game is] probably [in] fast-forward, I guess,” Starc said. “It’s happening quickly.”Related

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Amid the chaos, Starc deserves his flowers. It was very clear after the interminable build-up that most players on both sides were incredibly nervous. It would have been easy for Starc to fall into that camp, having to lead an attack that had neither Pat Cummins nor Josh Hazlewood in it for the first time at home since 2022. When both men will return remains unknown. Cummins has said he is hopeful to be fit for Brisbane, but Hazlewood is unavailable until further notice, with concerns about his chances of returning at all quietly growing.But Starc said he had no nerves.”Not really actually, strangely quite calm for the week,” he said. “Even till we got to the ground, still had the sense of occasion, but until we were out there for the anthems, and then first ball was when sort of the beans start to go.”He held his nerve when all about him were losing theirs even when the beans started to go. There was no Rory Burns moment, as Zak Crawley defended an excellent first delivery to a groan from the 43,591 who had made it through the gate before the start of play. They witnessed a masterclass with Starc’s next five. Crawley was not given any width or length to work with. He flashed once and missed. He tried again last ball and nicked it to Khawaja at slip. England were 0 for 1 after the first over of the series for the third time in the last five Ashes in Australia.Scott Boland struggled to find his length with new ball at the other end with England, and specifically Ben Duckett, collaring him in prophetic fashion at six-an-over.Duckett looked sharp, but Starc was sharper, zipping through a 142.6kph thunderbolt to pin him plumb lbw.Mitchell Starc made an early impression on the series•AFP/Getty ImagesThen came Joe Root, with so much expectation on him to break his century drought in Australia. Starc ensured he didn’t get off the mark. Using the wobble-seam delivery he’s perfected in the latter stages of his career, he angled into leg on a good length at 142.8kph and nipped it across. One of the greatest players of this generation got turned inside out like a pretzel as he nicked it to third slip.Not a single delivery in the 35-year-old’s first spell was under 140kph, and he had figures of 6-3-17-3. At lunch he had figures of 8-4-24-3, while the rest of Australia’s attack had returns of 15-1-76-1.After lunch he continued his solo carnage. Ben Stokes dropped to one knee, fist on the ground for balance, staring at the pitch in front of him and daring not to look back at his splayed stumps behind. Starc had snaked a ball back through his gate at 140.9kph to spark another almighty roar from the Perth fans. He has now dismissed Stokes 10 times in Test cricket in 22 meetings for a cost of just 190 runs.His fifth was inevitable. Gus Atkinson meekly nicked to slip. He had claimed all five with his wobble-seam deliveries, nicking three right-handers with balls nipping away, and dismissing two left-handers with balls snaking in. It was a showcase of his skill and development across the course of 101 Tests, to have such a huge impact when then was no trademark conventional swing on offer.”[The ball] was a bit like a hockey puck,” Starc said. “It was out of shape pretty early. I don’t think it was going to swing at all. It didn’t really stay on axis. So those wobbles seemed to be the one to work for most guys through the day. I’ve said it before, but two of my best mates are two of the best exponents of it in the world. So to learn off Josh and Pat, I think I said it a while ago, but if I’d listened to those two a bit earlier, might have had it in the repertoire a little bit earlier.”He was gifted the last two wickets for his first career seven-for but it was no less than he deserved. However, by the evening session, his mighty performance had been lost in the chaos of Australia’s batting. Jofra Archer saw Starc’s low-140kph thunderbolts and raised it up towards 150kph. Brydon Carse borrowed the wobble seam and added steepling bounce to make it unplayable. Stokes added the finishing touches to leave Australia 123 for 9 after another Perth collapse. But Starc refused to throw his batters under the bus.Joe Root was picked off for a duck by Mitchell Starc•Getty Images”I think we often sit here and see, last year it was a 17-wicket day, this year it’s 19 wickets, we often sit here and say, it’s the wicket or it’s the batting, but I think both teams bowled really well,” Starc said.”I’m sure both teams probably want to change, perhaps, their approach. But sometimes you can sit there and say, it’s pretty good bowling from both teams.”He’s not wrong. The standard of bowling was exceptional. But some of the batting from Australia deserves to be questioned. The shots of Travis Head, Cameron Green, Alex Carey and Starc himself were not mistakes forced by great deliveries. They were perhaps forced by the overall pressure England’s cadre of quicks created. But it was another example of Australia’s batting letting their bowling down. It’s left Starc contemplating another big shift on day two off not much rest.”It is what it is,” Starc said. “Sometimes you’re faced with that. I’ve played long enough to have trained the body to need to do that if I have to. Obviously, you always like to sit back and watch your team bat. Sometimes you have short turnarounds.”It’s just the nature of Test cricket and a tough day’s work for both batting groups.”

Issy Wong talks about being a marmite fiend, Taunton’s best-kept secret and her mum’s Yorkshire puddings, with a little help from her MI team-mates, Harmanpreet Kaur and Jhulan Goswami

Interview by Vishal Dikshit11-Mar-2024If you could just eat one thing for the rest of your life, what would it be?
Just one thing every day for breakfast, lunch and dinner? Oh my god! Probably Marmite. It’s a spread we have at home, savoury spread. I take it everywhere with me, so I’ve got a jar of it. It comes with me in my suitcase. You can have it on toast for breakfast, sometimes you can even have it like a toasted sandwich for lunch or on toast with scrambled egg and then for dinner if you’re making a gravy, you can put Marmite in the gravy. So it’s pretty versatileWhat’s your go-to meal?
All the hotels do a chicken breast, mashed potatoes and vegetables which is pretty good. It’s quite plain but it’s just a safe bet, you know what you’re going to get. You get vegetables, you get carbohydrate, you got protein, often comes off quite nice like gravy as well? Which is nice. Tastes pretty good.What’s the least healthy thing we’d find in your fridge right now?
In the mini-fridge [at the hotel], not a lot actually (). In my fridge at home… I quite like custard. I don’t have it on its own, but it gets stored in the fridge. Or Babybels. Do you have them here? Little cheese wrapped in wax. I could smash like six of them in a row ().What’s one food you had to give up to get fit for cricket?
Everything in moderation is all right. One meal isn’t going to make me unfit for cricket. It’s when you have one meal seven times a week that you’re probably going to be in trouble. Probably try and eat less ice cream and save it for special occasions. Which cricketer you know is the best cook?
I think Harmanpreet’s a pretty good cook – she got her hand up over there. Harman, you have to cook for me. You can’t say you’re the best cook and not cook for me.Harmanpreet: I can make… omelette?If Harman was not sitting here, who would you name?
Charlie Dean once cooked me some… she hardly cooked it, it was some very raw broccoli. Very undercooked broccoli. Not very good. Katie George is pretty good. She cooks a lot of good food. I’ll say she’s probably up there. She makes really good chips, but healthy chips.

“Taunton do yoghurt with banana and honey. You look at it and think, ‘Oh, it’s gonna be horrible,’ then you eat it and you’re like, ‘This is great!'”

Baked?
Yeah, baked in the oven. Very good.What is your favourite thing to cook?
I like barbecuing. I got a barbecue for my birthday couple of years ago so I’m all over it. I do Korean barbecue, chicken thigh. All sorts, really.One food you’ve discovered on cricket tours and grown to love.
What’s it called, ? Just .One food you miss when you’re on tour.
My mum’s Yorkshire puddings. My mum makes very good Yorkshire puddings.Jhulan Goswami: Why didn’t you bring some here?Wong: Gosy! You can’t bring them; they’ve got to be cooked fresh. Someone show her a picture. Yorkshire pudding goes with like a roast dinner with bit of gravy. My mum makes the best. If you want a Yorkshire pudding, have my mum’s. No other Yorkshire pudding tallies up to it.Which cricketing venue serves the best food?
Everybody says Lord’s is good. I think it’s too fancy because you sit there and then you got to wait, and they’ve never got enough of anything. And it’s always been fancy.Everyone says Lord’s, what do you say?
I think Edgbaston’s pretty good. They grow a lot of their own vegetables and stuff in the garden, which is nice. Where else is the food good? Taunton, they do a – it sounds really nasty – it’s yoghurt with banana and honey. You look at it and think, “Oh, it’s gonna be horrible,” then you eat it and you’re like, “This is great!”. You just have it every day for how many days you’re there.What’s your go-to post-workout snack?
Chicken roti (). We had to do something the other day [before the WPL 2024 started] where we had to agree on something we all ate after a game. And all three of us [Goswami and Harmanpreet] had to say chicken roti.And a protein shake, maybe.

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