New Tottenham captain named as Roberto De Zerbi picks five-man leadership group | OneFootball

Dutch defender replaces Cristian Romero as Archie Gray and Pedro Porro are promoted

Micky van de Ven has been named as the new Tottenham captain.

Manager Roberto De Zerbi confirmed the appointment on Friday, on the eve of Spurs’ first game of the new Premier League season.

Van de Ven has recently been rewarded with a new contract, and replaced Cristian Romero who joined Atletico Madrid earlier in August.

De Zerbi told reporters: “The new captain is Micky van de Ven. The second Pedro Porro, the third Ben Davies, the fourth James Maddison and the fifth Archie Gray.

“Why five captains? Just because I want many captains inside of the pitch and to be clear in the position.

“Every one of them deserves to be captain or in the group of the captains, but personality and passion is not if you are captain or not captain.”

Micky van de Ven

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Davies and Maddison have previously been part of leadership groups under past managers Thomas Frank and Ange Postecoglou.

World Cup winner Porro and versatile midfielder Gray are new additions, replacing Romero and Guglielmo Vicario, who has joined Juventus on loan and is unlikely to return.

The new season mark a fresh start for Spurs and De Zerbi after narrowly avoiding relegation on the final day of the previous campaign, but the manager wants to keep the pain of those days in mind heading into the new term.

He said: "[It’s been a ] very intense three months, but I think we can't forget what happened. Last season is a big lesson for us. We have to go on another page and start an important season.

"We're building a new project. The first two targets is very clear in ourselves is to find the soul of the team. Second target to improve in our organisation with and without the ball. Our style has to be the key of our season."