Tanganga reveals Chelsea trials and opens up on impressing Mourinho in Amazon docu-series

For those who are not looking for ‘All or Nothing: Tottenham Hotspur’ spoilers from the upcoming episodes of the Amazon documentary, look away now.

There were very few silver linings for Tottenham Hotspur to take following the 2019/20 season, but the emergence of young academy prospect, Japhet Tanganga was certainly one.

Tanganga, who had been at the club for over ten years, was selected by Jose Mourinho to make his Premier League debut against Liverpool back in January.

The young central defender impressed so much in this baptism of fire that he retained his starting spot days later against Middlesbrough in the FA Cup, even scooping up the Man of the Match award at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.

Across the season, Tanganga eventually made 11 appearances for Spurs, with Mourinho trusting him at centre-back, right-back, and left-back (Wikipedia).

While Spurs fans will certainly know a lot more about the 20-year-old than they did at the start of last season, some may not realise that he once had trials with Chelsea.

In episode four of the Amazon ‘All or Nothing: Tottenham Hotspur’ documentary, Tanganga opened up on the Chelsea trials and impressing Jose Mourinho at Spurs.

He said (All or Nothing – Episode 4 – 5 minute): “This is important to me and I need to concentrate and be disciplined. I’ve still got a long way to go. A lot of people don’t know this but I got scouted by Chelsea first. Got scouted by Chelsea, had a few trials there and I came from my local club, Edmonton All-Stars, which is not far from the stadium, like down the road.

“For me, to be working under the best manager in the world, it doesn’t get any better than that. You’ve got to compose yourself, you cannot show that you’re some kind of fan. You have to be like ‘oh nah’. He doesn’t know my capabilities, but I have the opportunity to give him a good example of myself and show what I’m capable of doing.”

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