Son fills Kane void to give Spurs 2-1 win at Middlesbrough

Mauricio Pochettino says it is important that Tottenham’s players are “desperate” to stay at the club and do not need to be convinced to remain at White Hart Lane.

‘I think he can have an impact playing for 90 minutes but for now he is coming from the bench because last season was very hard for him.

“I didn’t want to bring in an unbelievable player and someone not as good in the same position”.

Vertonghen’s current contract is due to expire in 2018 after he agreed a four-year deal with an option for two more years in 2012, while he shelved talks with the club in September 2014 shortly after Pochettino’s appointment. Dembele appears more likely to come off the bench in this one.

Kyle Walker put pen to paper on a new contract this week, to follow in the footsteps of Dele Alli, Christian Eriksen, Eric Dier, Danny Rose, Harry Winks and Tom Carroll. Having played in the 1st and 3rd round draw with Everton 1: 1 Liverpool 1: 1, in other meetings consistently prevailed over Crystal Palace 1: 0, Stoke City 0: 4 and Sunderland 1: 0.

Tottenham continued to dominate and doubled their lead with Son netting his second of the day midway through the half with a superb shot into the top corner of the net after some poor Boro defending.

Pochettino has an excellent record for developing young talent and admits he would love to field a whole team of home-grown players in the future.

“That is a very bad way”. They need to ask us to stay here.

He also featured for Spurs in their Champions League group stage opener against Monaco at Wembley. Boro dropped to 15th while Spurs jumped up to second.

“I was a little disappointed because we created a lot of chances and we weren’t clinical enough in front of goal”, added Pochettino.

With Borough making important and eye catching signings, including youngster Viktor Fischer, Centre back Calum Chambers who is on loan from Arsenal and former Manchester City striker Alvaro Negredo, all of whom have Champions League experience, then you can see The Riverside outfit going far. That is the big message from them all.

“We need to provide the key players with a good environment, a solid project and not [have] to convince [them] – the players [must] want to be part of this project”.