When Xavi Simons ruptured his ACL at Molineux and Dominic Solanke limped off in the same game, the prevailing mood around Tottenham was close to despair – and we have now identified exactly why the judgement that followed was premature.
The two players everyone had agreed were our most important attackers were both gone for the season, and the three left standing, Randal Kolo Muani, Mathys Tel and Richarlison, were three players the fanbase had spent weeks questioning.
Roberto De Zerbi walked into a pre-Villa press conference and said, calmly and with conviction, that Spurs could play with those three and that “they are not worse players. They are different with characteristics but very good players.” Most of us weren’t convinced.
By the time Richarlison had powered a header into the net at Villa Park, Tel had put in the cross that made it, and Kolo Muani had spent an hour making a Champions League-chasing defence look very uncomfortable, it read differently. It read like a manager who had seen something in training that the rest of us had not yet been shown.
Of course, one strong performance does not undo a difficult season. But what Sunday produced was specific enough, and sustained enough, to demand a reassessment. These are not bit-part players finding their feet. These are footballers with serious pedigrees, and under De Zerbi’s system, all three contributed directly to a result that moved Spurs out of the relegation zone.
What Mathys Tel, Richarlison and Kolo Muani did to earn their Tottenham XI spots
Start with Tel, because Sunday was his most complete performance in a Tottenham shirt since he signed permanently last summer for a reported £30m. Playing on the right side of the attacking three, he was direct, physical and intelligent throughout. His inswinging cross for Richarlison’s header in the 25th minute was technically excellent, cut perfectly across the box. He won duels, he pressed, and he caused problems for a Villa backline that had no answer for his movement.
Richarlison’s contribution was the goal but also the lead-up work. He was the body in the box when Tel’s cross came in, and he had the movement and the contact to finish it. This was his 10th Premier League goal of the season, making him only the second Brazilian ever to score 10 or more league goals in five different Premier League seasons, equalling Roberto Firmino.
There is a version of Richarlison the fanbase has fixed in their memory: the player who missed sitters, picked up stupid bookings and spent more than a third of his Tottenham career in the treatment room. That version is real and the concerns are valid. But it is not the only version.
Kolo Muani, in many ways, was the one who answered the loudest. He arrived at Spurs on loan from PSG last September, a player who had cost the French champions a deal confirmed at €90m in total – including add-ons – from Eintracht Frankfurt, and who had endured a difficult spell in Paris before a strong loan in the second half of last season at Juventus. The criticism here all season has been fair: one Premier League goal from more than 1,400 minutes is not what you expect from a player of his calibre.
But the Villa performance showed something different. Playing on the left of the attacking three, he completed four of his six dribbles, took five touches in the opposition box, and contributed two tackles and four recoveries. The pressing, the direct running and the defensive work are exactly what De Zerbi values, and Kolo Muani delivered all three.
De Zerbi said after the final whistle: “Today also, Randal Kolo Muani and Mathys Tel, they played a fantastic game. Joao Palhinha and Bentancur were incredible.” That is a manager who got exactly what he asked for from players the fanbase had largely written off.
Why Tottenham’s attacking depth gives Roberto De Zerbi a real platform to build on beyond Premier League survival
Here is the optimistic version of what Sunday showed us, and we think it deserves to be said clearly. If Tottenham stay up, they go into 2026–27 with this front three still available, potentially alongside a fit Solanke, a returning Simons, Dejan Kulusevski and James Maddison. That is a lot of attacking talent, more than most squads in this division, and under a manager who has now shown he can get serious performances from all three, it becomes genuinely exciting.
Tel is 20 years old, signed permanently until 2031 and already a Europa League winner with this club. Sunday added a new dimension: the willing runner, the wide threat, the assist merchant. He is going to be central to whatever De Zerbi builds here.
Kolo Muani’s future is less certain: he is on loan from PSG and a permanent deal will depend heavily on whether Spurs stay up and what fee can be agreed. But what Sunday showed is that in the right system, with direct partners and a manager who asks him to press and move, he has real value.
Richarlison, for his part, has wanted to stay and fight for his place throughout this season. He is at his best in exactly this kind of moment: physical, focused, aware that each game carries genuine consequence. With Solanke expected back fit next season, his role will be defined by his ability to compete for that starting position rather than occupy it by default. He thrives with that pressure. Sunday was evidence of that.
Can Spurs trust Kolo Muani, Tel and Richarlison next season?
The broader point is about how quickly we, as a fanbase, can write players off. Kolo Muani had a difficult start to his Spurs career and we had largely made up our minds. Richarlison had his booking issues, his injury record and his difficult spells, and the narrative around him had calcified. Tel was loved but often seen as a livewire off the bench rather than a genuine starter.
De Zerbi looked at those three players and said, in a press conference when the mood could not have been lower, that they were good enough. He was right. Not in a polite way, but in the specific, tactical sense that they could together win a match against a top-five opponent. And on Sunday night, in front of a hostile crowd, against a side chasing the Champions League, they made it true.
It remains to be seen what the squad looks like after the summer, and how many of these three are still here when De Zerbi’s first full season begins. But whatever decisions are made, they should be made with Sunday night in mind. These players are not passengers. They are footballers who stepped up when it mattered most, and that is worth something.
- READ MORE: It’s finally time for Richarlison to carry the weight of Tottenham’s attack on his shoulders