There was a lot of skepticism around Tottenham Hotspur’s new era under Thomas Frank considering the pressure on him after the club’s worst-ever finish in the Premier League era last season.
However, the Lilywhites have done fairly well in the transfer market with the signings of Mohammed Kudus, Kota Takai and Mathys Tel among others.
They still need another midfielder and a striker to support Dominic Solanke upfront and as per rumours, they are pushing for both their targets this summer.
Spurs eventually started their preseason camp in Hong Kong when they faced Arsenal in a North London derby on Thursday.
It was a closely fought encounter between two great teams and eventually both teams were separated by a moment of brilliance from Pape Matar Sarr, who scored a screamer from the centre circle, lobbing it over Davi Raya before nestling it into the net.
Both the teams fielded their new signings in this match as Kudus played for Tottenham while, Christian Norgaard started the preseason game with Viktor Gyokeres, Martin Zubimendi, Cristhian Mosquera coming off the bench.
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It was a preseason friendly, but nothing felt like that on Thursday at the Kai Tak Sports Park in Hong Kong as both the teams played in front of record-breaking crowd of 49,975 in the country.
What did Tottenham boss Thomas Frank say after the win?
The former Brentford manager was ecstatic with the win and also highlighted how this sets the tone for the start of his reign in North London.
“This was as positive a result as you can get in terms of reinforcing the messages and team building and desire to defend was good,” Frank told at the post-match press conference.
He also refuses to call this a preseason friendly, sharing how much both teams wanted to win the clash.
“It is very pleasing to win my first north London derby. And you could not call that a friendly. People could see the desire from both teams and our great desire to keep a clean sheet.”
Tottenham looked more assured during corners at both ends of the field, a noticeable difference from the Ange Postecoglou era and it is down to their new set-piece coach Andreas Georgson.
“The first half we were good and the second half we defended a bit too much but that was good, and our set pieces were good as well in attack and defence,” Frank acknowledged.
Frank will have to wait for his first-ever official North London derby as Spurs play Arsenal in November. at the Emirates.
But before that his first target with the Europa League winners will be to guide them to the UEFA Super Cup triumph against PSG on August 13.
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