Spurs flop was once dubbed the next Eto'o but ended up worse than Janssen

Spurs flop was once dubbed the next Eto’o but ended up worse than Janssen

The Tottenham Hotspur support widely acknowledges the job that Ange Postecoglou has been doing since arriving from dominant Scottish champions Celtic last summer.

It’s an appointment that has captivated (the Spurs fanbase) and irked (the rest of London) and refashioned the north London club as an attractive stomping ground, with Spurs headed for disaster last season after trundling to an eighth-placed Premier League finish and thus losing Harry Kane to Bayern Munich.

After 24 matches this season, Spurs perch in fourth place and have finally put the host of injuries and suspensions that have marred progress in the past: the business end awaits but there is conviction in Tottenham’s performances and an inner belief that Postecoglou will mastermind a return to prominence on the continent.

Influential signings such as James Maddison and Micky van de Ven have been vital to the resurgence but there are so many promising acquisitions that denote a change in strategy, a fresh take and a scrupulous approach to identifying and landing fresh faces capable of taking Spurs to new heights.

It’s refreshing, to say the least, with the recent past littered with too many misfires in the transfer market that have ultimately precluded chairman Daniel Levy from building a club capable of winning silverware and sustaining a spot at the forefront of English football.

It hasn’t always been awful, with Heung-min Son, appointed captain last summer, one of the game’s standout stars since joining the club from Bayer Leverkusen for £22m back in 2015.

However, the South Korean arrived at the same time as Clinton N’Jie, and the difference between the respective players could not be any starker.

Spurs’ signing of Clinton N’Jie

Son might have been a revelation – Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp has wistfully remarked that he regrets having not signed the “world-class” forward – but N’Jie was on the other end of the spectrum after arriving during the same transfer window.

Completing a £12m transfer from Lyon, N’Jie, who was 22 years old at the time, arrived as one of the most promising youngsters in French football and was viewed as the perfect counterbalance to Kane up front, who was Tottenham’s sole striker following Roberto Soldado’s move to Villarreal (another huge disappointment).

The Cameroon native looked to have the making of a high-class and dynamic attacker, scoring seven goals and supplying eight assists during the 2014/15 Ligue 1 season and had attracted Arsenal’s attention the year before.

Fleet-footed, direct and versatile, N’Jie had the trappings of a successful Premier League star down the line and had even received some glowing praise before making the move to London, so there was every hope that he was the prodigious talent to lift Spurs to triumph.

What they were saying when Spurs signed N’Jie

Mauricio Pochettino was only one year into his reign at White Hart Lane but he had finished fifth in the 2014/15 term and was steadily making improvements to a team that would go from strength to strength in the years to come.

Of course, the 5 foot 9 N’Jie was not among the core clutch of talents to put Spurs in the ascendancy but he was certainly touted for such, having drawn comparisons to his Cameroonian countryman Samuel Eto’o.

Such effusive praise derived from a stellar start to life on the international stage, posting six goals from his first ten caps for his nation, with a seemingly innate eye for goal tantalising his role as the iconic centre-forward’s natural successor in the verdancy of central Africa.

Pep Guardiola, who managed Eto’o at Barcelona, once gushed over the myriad qualities that established him as one of the finest players of his generation.

The illustrious Spaniard said: “Incredible player, outstanding striker, one of the best I met and have seen, personality, character, top scorer, more pressure, better performance. I had him for one season.”

A four-time winner of the prestigious African Footballer of the Year award, Tottenham transfer bosses would have been aware of such parallels and had hungrily approached N’Jie to sign their own version of Eto’o, who scored 56 times for his nation.

Big boots to fill and it’s fair to say that N’Jie came up short, having failed miserably at Tottenham and since stuttered throughout a career that has never found the track that was trodden during those exciting early days.

Clinton N’Jie’s Spurs career in numbers

N’Jie, now aged 30, only spent one campaign in England before heading back to France, and while his time at Tottenham was marred by injuries, it was clear that he perhaps wasn’t fit to lead the line for years to come.

Clinton N’Jie: Key Characteristics

Strengths

Weaknesses

Long shots

Finishing

Crossing

Ball retention

Aerial duels

Discipline

Source: WhoScored

N’Jie only completed 14 appearances for Tottenham and failed to score for the club, though he laid off Erik Lamela’s cherry-topping finish during a 4-1 romp over Manchester City in the brightest moment of his time in England.

His terrible term in the Premier League is very much at the nadir of the transfer business under Levy and is probably even worse than the £19m acquisition of Dutch sharpshooter Vincent Janssen, who moved from AZ Alkmaar on a four-year contract one year on.

Janssen certainly held more promise after scoring 32 goals across his final season in the Netherlands, and while he was an unquestionable failure of a signing, with a measly six-goal return from 42 Lilywhites fixtures, he at least managed to make some kind of an impact before his £6m sale to Mexican outfit Monterrey in 2019.

It’s important to remember that the ace spent considerable time on the sidelines due to injury but the fact that Pochettino allowed him to leave on loan to Marseille in 2016, with a €7m (£6m) buy option inserted, tells the conclusive story surrounding the hopes that he would impress in the future.

N’Jie was succeeded by France U21 winger Georges-Kévin Nkoudou, who joined for £11m, but that’s a tale of woe best shelved for now…

Where Are They Now

Wondering where your most loved or hated players are now? Football FanCast’s Where Are They Now series is here to help.

Now playing for Sivasspor in Turkey, N’Jie has only scored 24 league goals in the eight-and-a-half years since leaving England and it’s fair to say that his place in Pochettino’s squad was not the success story that was hoped for upon his signing.

Given that Son arrived at the time time, it’s clear that Spurs invested time, energy and effort into the right player.