Harry Kane may immediately come to mind when talking about Tottenham Hotspur’s greatest players of the past decade or so, but the influence of his former colleague Son Heung-min cannot be ignored.
In fact, it is arguably the South Korean star who enjoys greater legendary status at N17, particularly for his contribution to the club’s Europa League success last season, his final season at the club.
Although perhaps waning in strength, the aging winger still ended the 2024/25 campaign with 17 goals and assists in the Premier League, which would still be more than any Spurs player in the division this season.
With new manager Roberto De Zerbi looking for inspiration and someone to keep his team out of danger, Son was perhaps the perfect solution.
Sadly, with just six games left in the season, the Italian will need to find a new attacking figurehead in north London.
Spurs forwards’ Premier League performances this season
As mentioned above, no Lilywhite player comes close to Son’s record of seven goals and 10 assists in the top flight in the 2024/25 season, with Richarlison being the only player in the team to even reach double figures for goal involvement.
Incoming Paul Gascoigne could finally end Simmons’ Spurs career
The Spurs may already have the perfect replacement for Xavi Simmons.
The Brazilian, who scored Spurs’ latest goal away at Anfield, has 12 goals and an assist so far despite only scoring 25 in the league since returning in the summer of 2022.
The former Everton marksman started alongside Dominic Solanke and Randal Kolo Muani away at the Stadium of Light on Sunday, but both have had a disastrous season in the capital.
In Solanke’s case, the Englishman has only scored three league goals in 2025/26, two of which came in a spectacular comeback at home to Thomas Frank’s Manchester City, and his season has been dominated by injury troubles.
As for Kolo Muani, the Frenchman’s only goal in the league came in a north London derby defeat against Igor Tudor’s Arsenal, and De Zerbi admitted before the trip to Sunderland that the on-loan striker had not had a good year by his standards.
Spurs Forward – PL 25/26 | ||
|---|---|---|
player | game | Goal (assist) |
Richarlison | 27 | 9(3) |
telephone number | twenty five | 3 (0) |
Solanke | 13 | 3 (0) |
holy | 19 | 2 (6) |
Johnson* | 16 | 2 (0) |
first class | twenty four | 1(1) |
simmons | 26 | 1 (4) |
deleted | twenty four | 0 (2) |
*Sold in January | ||
Mohamed Kudus, meanwhile, is expected to miss the rest of the season after a disappointing injury setback, while Xavi Simons has scored just one league goal since joining from RB Leipzig for £52 million and was once again overlooked from the start on Wearside.
Options are scarce then, but could one solution lie in Tottenham’s new son?
New son could be the guy who fires the Spurs to ensure safety.
Few could have predicted that Son, who arrived from the Bundesliga as a relatively unknown prospect in the summer of 2015, would enjoy an incredible 10-year journey in a Spurs shirt.
It’s worth remembering that the then-only 23-year-old had a rather modest start at Premier League level, scoring just five goals and assisting in his debut season in 2015/16.
The rest, as they say, is history, and the 173-goal heroics offer reason to be patient regarding Spurs’ other Bundesliga player, Matthijs Tell.
Still just 20 years old, the former Bayern Munich starlet has not been as explosive as expected since his first loan move in January 2025, scoring just six goals in 52 games in all competitions.
Among them, he has scored only three goals so far this season, but all of them have come in league matches, and in the last tournament he started on the bench due to concerns about injury during the international break.
It has yet to fully materialize in north London, but like Son, who scored 20 goals for Hamburg in 1978 and 29 goals for Bayer Leverkusen in 1987, the youngster showed his talent in Germany, scoring 16 goals in 83 appearances for Bayern.
For example, in the 2023/24 season, he scored 7 goals in just 1023 minutes in the Bundesliga, despite starting only 16 games in total for the Bavarian giants.
The French U21 national team mirrors Son as a natural left winger who can also play in the center, and is expected to develop a more stable game.
Similarly, in last month’s win over Atletico Madrid, he flashed briefly from the right flank, setting up Kolo Muani’s goal with a delicate dink into the penalty area.
It is these qualities that should make Tell emerge as a star candidate for manager De Zerbi, and the new manager is clearly a fan, admitting that he tried to sign the former Rennes player during his time in charge of Marseille.
Tell will lose his left wing spot after Richarlison and others wasted their few chances at the weekend, giving him the chance to truly succeed Son in that side.
Someone needs to cause this aggression in life, so why can’t a 20-year-old do it?
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