Former Tottenham Hotspur attacking midfielder Rafael van der Vaart was a wonderful footballer back in the day and one of the best No. 10s in European football for both Spurs and Hamburg, even making his way to Real Madrid at one point.
Van der Vaart now works as a pundit and has become famous for being a hot take artist, and while his heart may not be in a bad place, he is supplying some rather uninformed negativity that Spurs can really do without right now.
Recently, Van der Vaart heavily criticized Tottenham, accusing them of playing awful football and signing no name players for too much money who do not belong at Tottenham. The former Dutch midfielder said on the Rondo Podcast, via Chris Cowlin:
Tottenham only signed established players this summer
“They’ve certainly messed up the market a bit. Players we don’t even know get sold there, and you’re already looking at a price tag of 40 or 50 million. That leaves clubs like Ajax, PSV, or Feyenoord thinking: ‘What are we supposed to do?'” regarding the overall available talent pool. I can’t even bear to watch them anymore. I find Tottenham truly awful to watch. When you spend that much money on those players… I find it truly incredible. Truly incredible.”
Absolutely nothing that Rafael van der Vaart saying here makes any sense at all. Tottenham Hotspur literally only signed established players this past summer transfer window. Sandro Tonali and Mateus Fernandes were literally two of the best midfielders on the open market with clubs like Manchester City, Manchester United, Arsenal, and even Real Madrid interested in them.
Andy Robertson was a legend for Liverpool, Tosin Adarabioyo and Mykhaylo Mudryk came from another Big Six club in Chelsea, and Savio and Omar Marmoush were both recently hyped signings for Manchester City. Jan Paul van Hecke is literally one of the best players on Van der Vaart's Dutch national team, Marcos Senesi was a Premier League Team of the Season candidate for Bournemouth in 2025/26, and even Martin Dubravka is a seasoned goalkeeper in the Premier League.
None of these players were no names, and the most expensive players in Fernandes, Savio, and Tonali were not players who broke the market and are certainly not players " we don't even know". Nothing Van der Vaart is saying about Spurs makes a single lick of sense, and with all due respect to what he did for the club, it's better to ignore what he is saying.
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