Japhet Tanganga gave an insight into Antonio Conte’s coaching methods this week in an interview with Football London, while also opening up on his period on the sidelines with fellow injured academy graduate, Oliver Skipp.
Amidst Conte’s infamously gruelling pre-season training on a trip to South Korea, Tanganga described work under the Italian as ‘intense’, although he welcomes the work.
Tanganga played 45 minutes against Team K-League in Tottenham’s first pre-season friendly yesterday, lining up on the right side of a back three.
On training under Conte, Tanganga said: “It’s intense, I think not only as a defender but as a team. He really wants us to work hard.
“He has his methods and he really wants us to buy into it, so it’s about concentration and focusing and implementing what he wants on the pitch. It’s all good.
“He speaks to you to let you know if you’re doing good or bad, what you need to improve on and what you’re doing well. He’s a good coach.
“I think the ownership has to come from the players. The gaffer gives us the solutions, but it’s up to us on the pitch to decide what is the right one.
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“It’s about taking in the information and then doing the extra work, whether that’s studying video analysis of some games back to see what you could have done better or you could have implemented that he wanted you to put in.
“Then it’s taking it from there, taking ownership and putting it into practice on the pitch.”
Japhet missed the final 18 Premier League games of the season with a knee injury last year, something that has become a regular occurrence for the 23-year-old. He only managed 11 appearances in the competition all season (TransferMarkt).
The defender opened up on his injury spell alongside teammate Oliver Skipp, revealing they still attended meetings and worked hard on the theory behind Conte’s teachings.
He said: “We were injured together and we would go into the meetings and he would be talking about the defenders and what they needed to implement.
“So we would just work out what we would do if I were playing so when we did get back fit, which we are too, we knew what we had to do.
“So it’s just keeping our head with the team, being together and knowing that when we were back we were ready to implement what he wanted.
“Last season got off to a good start, playing a lot of games and then the injury came. It was a bit frustrating, it’s been like that pretty much since I broke through.
“I’ve always said it’s part of the game and it’s something you have to deal with. I’m just thankful that I’m back now and back with the team.”
Spurs Web Opinion:
This is a really interesting insight into Conte’s training methods and how all the players are buying into the regime from top to bottom, even the ones out injured. That is how you create a squad capable of winning trophies, rather than an XI capable of winning games.
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