LONDON (Reuters) – Tottenham Hotspur’s Cristian Romero and Son Heung-min have returned from international duty fit to face Fulham in the Premier League on Monday, with manager Ange Postecoglou saying on Friday that all those coming back are ready to play.
There had been concerns that Argentina centre-back Romero and South Korea forward Son had picked up knocks playing for their countries but both are expected to be available.
“It’s been a pretty positive international break for us,” Postecoglou told reporters. “Everyone is kind of back and medical reports seem to be good so no real issues around the guys from a fitness perspective.”
The Spurs manager was also happy to see full back Destiny Udogie making a debut for Italy and central defender Micky van de Ven playing his first games for Netherlands.
“Giovani Lo Celso played for Argentina as well which was great, so those guys all came through it well.”
The two-week break has been a chance for some of the injured players to recover, such as Brennan Johnson and Bryan Gil.
“With Brennan, he’s had a good, solid couple of weeks of training which is good for him. They’re all good. Playing Monday night helps us in terms of that aspect, with Brennan we’ll see how he goes in the next couple of days.”
Midfielder Rodrigo Bentancur has yet to play this season due to a knee injury and the manager is not going to rush things.
“No, he won’t be in the squad Monday. We’ll take our time with him as he’s missed a lot of football,” said Postecoglou.
“Now he’s sort of fully training, so that means he’s into the whole session. We’ve drip-fed him into training the last month and he’s coped pretty well with that.”
Unbeaten Spurs are the early pacesetters but Postecoglou knows he still has work to do having joined the club in June.
“It doesn’t change the way I’m thinking. It pains me to say we’re very much still in the beginning,” he said.
“My thought is continual development. Everything is in the early stages. If you get side-tracked and move away from the plans, you’re going to stumble.”
Tottenham went top with a 1-0 win at Luton Town in their last game but midfield dynamo Yves Bissouma received a red card and is suspended for the visit of Fulham.
“We’ve got some options, certainly Pierre (Emile Hojbjerg) is a ready-made replacement, he’s been training really hard. He’s obviously probably wanted to be playing more because he’s pretty much been a constant for the last two to three years.”
Spurs are level on 20 points with Arsenal and host a Fulham side with 12 points in 12th place but who knocked Tottenham out of the League Cup after a penalty shootout in August.
(Reporting by Trevor Stynes; Editing by Ken Ferris)
