Tottenham Bringing More Kids to Europa League, Will Any Play

For the second straight week we know Tottenham are filling in injury induced roster gaps with more kids from the Academy. The real question is that with a three goal lead already in hand, do any of the youngsters play, or is this a continued exercise in absorbing the experience. While it is up to the full-fledged members of the senior team to put Tottenham in a position to play some of the academy kids, this is what we hope to see.

More Tottenham Youngsters

Last week during the first leg of the Round of 32 match-up versus Wolfsberger, José Mourinho and company brought four academy players on the trip. For Dennis Cirkin it was not his first taste of the Europa League experience and for Dane Scarlett he actually has made an appearance in the competition this season.

In addition to those two, fellow youngsters Jamie Bowden and Marcel Lavinier made the trip. Bowden has long been at Tottenham but has yet to feature for the senior squad, while Lavinier is relatively new to the academy after being released by Chelsea.

This week, we get two familiar names and two more new names added to the list of youngsters José Mourinho is providing a little taste of the big-time too. According to the team’s website, Mourinho is quoted as saying that Nile John – a right-sided midfielder – and Dilan Markanday – an attacking midfielder – will join Lavinier and Scarlett who will once again get the call.

Markanday (19) is described on Spurs website as a clever attacking midfielder who technically scored the first ever goal in the new stadium for the U-18s in a test event. John is a lifetime Tottenham Hotspur player – or as much as a soon-to-be 18-year-old can be. Nile John joined Tottenham at the early age of seven and looks to break through.

Can we Scarlett and Lavinier for an extended run?

While it would be quite remarkable for Markanday and John to both play given their first ever experience with the senior squad but expecting some real minutes for both Dane Scarlett and Marcel Lavinier should not be out of the question.

Dane Scarlett has previously appeared – albeit quite briefly – in both Europa League and the Premier League. What Scarlett has not really gotten an opportunity to do is to play. In the perfect world Scarlett gets 45 minutes to play – the entire second half. Realistically, if he can get the last 30 minutes, it would be nice.

Marcel Lavinier is a bit different given he is older and plays defense but presumably coming back for a second straight week has to mean something. Like Scarlett 30-45 minutes of play to get some real run out would be ideal, but is likely more than we will see. As a defender if Lavinier gets on for the last 5-10 minutes to just run about and hopefully get a few kicks in, it will be some progress.

Given the number of players our on loan, the issues with homegrown numbers, and the need to create more depth and competition in the side the academy is certainly one way to do it. Hopefully Wednesday we actually get to see some of that academy in action.