Tottenham Hotspur f.c.

2023 - 1 - 19

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Image courtesy of "Football.London"

Rodon's Messi and Neymar masterclass, Reguilon red card and ... (Football.London)

Here we take a look at how Tottenham's eight loan players fared over the past few days as Harry Winks returned and Joe Rodon faced Lionel Messi and Co.

The Frenchman was back in the team on Tuesday evening and played 102 minutes as they were knocked out of the Coppa Italia on penalties by Serie A basement boys Cremonese. In his absence, Villarreal recorded a point on Friday following a 1-1 draw at Celta Vigo. Completing 16 of his 19 passes and putting in three crosses, he also won five of his six ground duels in his limited time on the field. Following such a positive start to 2023 with game time coming his way after a nightmare 2022 through injury, Reguilon saw red in Atletico Madrid's 1-1 draw away at Almeria on Sunday. [Genova Today](https://www.genovatoday.it/sport/calcio/empoli-sampdoria-1-0-pagelle.html/pag/2), the Italian outlet clearly know they have a good player on their hands and are expecting more from him in the future. Taking to Instagram after his Sampdoria debut, Winks penned: "After a very tough six months injured, finally making my debut for this club was amazing. Having missed out the previous weekend against parent club Tottenham in the FA Cup as he was ineligible to feature, Scarlett got game time under his belt with two appearances against Bolton Wanderers. Named on the bench by boss Ryan Lowe, the Republic of Ireland international got 18 minutes under his belt as he came on in the closing stages of their 4-0 home defeat. Having a watching brief since making his loan switch to Sampdoria after requiring ankle surgery, things are now starting to look up for the midfielder. Rodon has had a tough time of it of late with limited football coming his way for Rennes. An off day for Udinese, their next game sees them travel to Serie A strugglers Sampdoria, who could potentially have Tottenham man Winks in the starting XI. It was not a bad week at all for a number of Tottenham's loan players.

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Antonio Conte unimpressed with Harry Kane question and asked if ... (Football.London)

The Tottenham Hotspur boss was asked about his tactics and whether he might ever deviate from the back three he uses at the club.

Keep this question for the future and I hope for you it happens one day that you can make this question to the club," he said. "In Chelsea, I started with a 4-2-3-1 and then changed because the characteristics of the players was not so good to play a back four. "In some games, you can try to put Kulusevski as wing-back and the other wing-back is Perisic, who is a winger. In the future, probably we can try to change, but if we lose, I'm justified. "It could happen and the system depends a lot on the characteristics of the players, especially the defenders. Some pundits have suggested that the team's play has become a bit predictable with such a rigid system and [Conte](https://www.football.london/all-about/antonio-conte) was asked ahead of Thursday's match at Manchester City whether there were any circumstances in which he would switch to a back four.

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