Spurs could land “outstanding” £30m Johnson upgrade

There is no escaping it: this season is turning into a disaster for Tottenham Hotspur.

Ange Postecoglou’s side find themselves in the bottom half of the Premier League table, with more losses than wins to their name, and as things stand, they seem to have an ever-growing injury list that has utterly decimated their defence.

However, there have been a couple of positives to take from the campaign so far, such as their progress in the League Cup and the fact that Dejan Kulusevski has taken a big step forward this year, but the manager still needs Daniel Levy and Co to dip into the transfer market this month and provide him with more options.

Fortunately, reports from late last month did link the club with an in-form attacker who’s won comparisons to the Swede and could be a dream upgrade on Brennan Johnson.

Spurs’ attacking options

So, while the defence has been a massive problem for Spurs this season, both in terms of how defenders have performed and the number of them who have been injured, the attack has generally been pretty good for the North Londoners.

For example, the Lilywhites have already found the back of the net on 41 occasions in their 19

league games, and there are five players with seven or more goals in all competitions in the squad.

Moreover, while he’s not necessarily been a complete game-changer for Postecoglou this season, summer signing Dominic Solanke has now found his feet in the team and currently has a brilliant haul of ten goals and five assists to his name in just 25 games.

Likewise, Kulusevski, despite playing in a midfield role for much of the campaign, already has seven goals and eight assists in just 28 appearances, which means he’s averaging a goal involvement every 1.86 games – more than justifying the “world-class” tag given to him by talent scout Jacek Kulig previously.

Lastly, while he can be frustrating at times and has a handful of poor games this season, Johnson has been a useful attacker for the manager, racking up a haul of 11 goals and three assists in 28 appearances, which comes out to an average of a goal involvement every other game.

However, while the Welshman has been good, a player Spurs were linked to just a few days ago could be the perfect upgrade, especially as he’s been compared to the incredible Kulusevski.

The Spurs target who could replace Johnson

So, to get straight to the point, the player in question is Celtic star Nicholas Kühn, who, according to a report from journalist Graeme Bailey late last month, is a player Tottenham are interested in.

The report claimed that while the Scottish giants are keen to keep the German attacker in Glasgow this month, a sizable offer could tempt them into selling and, according to another report from the Standard back in November, that fee could be up to £30m.

Now, that’s certainly a lot of money for a player from the Scottish Premiership, but given the fact he’s outperforming Johnson and has been compared to Kulusevski, he could be worth it.

So, before we look at how he’s outperforming the Welshman, it’s worth examining this comparison to the former Juventus star and where it comes from.

It primarily stems from FBref, which compares players in similar positions in Europe’s top five leagues, the Champions League and Europa League then creates a list of the ten most comparable players for each one, and, in this instance, has concluded that the Swede is the second most similar attacking midfielder or winger to the German over the last 365 days.

The best way to see where this comparison has come from is to look at the underlying metrics in which the pair rank closely, including, but not limited to, non-penalty expected goals, assists, shots on target, passing accuracy and more, all per 90.

With that said, why do we think he could be an upgrade on Johnson? Simply put, his output for the Hoops this season has been utterly sensational.

For example, in just 26 appearances, the “outstanding” right-winger, as dubbed by former Celtic star Aiden McGeady, has scored 14 goals and provided 11 assists, meaning he’s currently averaging a goal involvement every 1.04 games for the Glaswegian side.

Now, there is certainly something to be said for the level of opposition he is facing north of the border, but his output is so far ahead of the former Nottingham Forest ace’s at this moment in time that this feels like a transfer worth taking a risk on.

Ultimately, Johnson has been a valuable player for Spurs and Postecoglou this season, but at the moment, it feels as if Kühn’s ceiling is just that bit higher, and therefore, the North Londoners should do what they can to bring him to N17 this month.