Former Tottenham Hotspur defender, Luis Binks has admitted that his decision to leave Tottenham Hotspur last January was not one he took lightly.
The Spurs academy graduate left the North Londoners to sign for MLS side, Montreal Impact earlier this year, with reports indicating that Jose Mourinho tried everything he could to stop him.
The central defender has impressed at the heart of Montreal’s defence since his move to Canada, with his performances earning him a move to Bologna this summer.
The 19-year-old admitted that he could not see himself getting opportunities for the first-team at Spurs and decided to move in order to further his development.
Binks said in an interview to Football Ollie: “The decision to leave Spurs was a decision I thought about for many months. I wanted the exposure of regular first-team football as I felt the U23s league was not doing me any good and wouldn’t help me develop as quick as I could have.
“I was told that if I do well I might be able to go on the pre-season tour and if I had done well there then maybe cup games and bench appearances would come my way, but I’ve seen players such as KWP [Kyle Walker-Peters], Skippy [Oliver Skipp] and Troy [Parrott] and they hardly played games and for someone like me I look forward to games and it helps me develop.”
The teenager also revealed in the interview that Mourinho took a liking to him upon his arrival and called him up to train with the first-team regularly.
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The Portuguese coach has altered the club’s loan policy, with the Lilywhites now seemingly more willing to send out their top young talents than they were when Mauricio Pochettino was in-charge.
When asked if he could have potentially benefited by going out on loan had Mourinho arrived at Tottenham earlier, Binks said: “Maybe, but hindsight is a great thing so I don’t regret my decision one bit.
“I see players my age still just training with the first team and playing pre-season games and that’s amazing, but for me I’d still rather be out playing men’s football as I feel that’s how you learn from your mistakes when there is 3 points on the line in a men’s league.”
Spurs Web Opinion
Most of us were understanding of the idea behind Pochettino’s philosophy of having our talented young players train with the top coaches at the club rather than going out on loan. However, in hindsight, that approach has done us a considerable amount of harm. One gets the feeling that the likes of Skipp, Walker-Peters, Edwards and even Foyth could have benefited from being loaned out earlier. Not only would that have allowed them to get some games under their belt and we could have also got a better measure of their real value.
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