Tottenham ‘make approach’ to sign £10m man that can ease injury crisis after Postecoglou "reinforce" promise

Tottenham Hotspur have reportedly approached Atalanta about signing former Everton defender Ben Godfrey on a six-month loan deal to help ease their defensive injury crisis.

Godfrey made the move to the 2024 Europa League winners in June for a fee reported to be around £10m. However, the 26-year-old has made just one substitute appearance in Serie A which came in the first match of the season in a 4-0 win over Leece. He has been on the bench for the majority of league games but has missed a handful of fixtures through injury.

Football Insider has reported that a Spurs have contacted Atalanta about the possibility of signing Godfrey, who would likely be open to the move in order to get more game time. The player is a centre-back but can also play at right-back with his versatility another attractive quality.

Postecoglou on January business

Spurs boss Ange Postecoglou admitted ahead of Thursday’s loss to Nottingham Forest that Spurs needed to reinforce their squad in January. He said: "Like I said a while ago, we've been planning. A lot of it was going to be around where we're at around this time. Fair to say, we're still a little bit short in a couple of areas and we need to reinforce. January's trickier in terms of what sort of players you can bring in. For us, ideally, for any club, I guess, you want to bring in people who are going to make you stronger.

"I think the fact that, obviously, we're still in the Carabao Cup semi-final, still got Europe, FA Cup, we're in all the competitions, it's not like our schedule's going to ease up at any stage. So, I think it makes sense. We will try and reinforce, where and what number we'll have to wait and see."

Fresh blow makes need for additions greater

Cristian Romero, Micky van de Ven and Ben Davies are all out for Spurs currently while Radu Dragusin was forced with late on against Forest with an ankle injury. Speaking about the injury, Postecoglou told the Spurs website: “It was a knock on his ankle, he said he couldn’t continue, we’ll have to assess him and see how we are.”

While in his post-match press conference he added: “He was a bit sore. He hurt his ankle and said he couldn’t continue, so we'll just have to wait and see.”

Reflecting on the defeat, the Spurs boss added: “We are asking a lot of this group of players, a lot of these guys are playing every three days. It’s only logical they are not going to be at their sharpest, but they are trying. It’s obviously disappointing to be beaten. It was never going to be a game with too many chances, I thought we had a fair chance where we could have got something out of the game. But it was always going to be a tight game here. A disappointing goal we conceded, but aside from that the boys worked hard and we tried to generate as many opportunities as we could considering the context of the game and how Forest play. We just couldn’t get over the line.”