Bentancur reveals ‘honour’ at signing for Spurs
Wed 02 February 2022, 20:15|
Tottenham Hotspur
Rodrigo Bentancur has described joining us as “a pleasure and an honour”.
The Uruguay international signed on transfer deadline day from Juventus, having spent the last five years with the Serie A side.
Still only 24 years of age, the central midfielder arrives along with Juve team-mate Dejan Kulusevski to strengthen our squad ahead of an important second half of the season.
In advance of checking in at the Club in person later this week following the latest round of South American qualifiers for this year’s World Cup – he scored for Uruguay in Tuesday night’s 4-1 victory over Venezuela in Montevideo – Rodrigo was humble when speaking about how he feels to sign for us.
“It’s a great Club with great players – always competing in all competitions,” he told us from Uruguay. “I was very happy when I heard about the interest in me and thankfully I’ve joined now.
“It’s a huge pleasure and an honour to be able to represent this shirt. As I said, it’s a brilliant Club and a great league that I’ve always liked and now I’m going to have the chance to enjoy it alongside the other great players that we have. I think they’ll help me to grow a lot on a footballing level, and obviously we’ll always try to give everything we can to represent the Club together.”
Rodrigo played against us in the Champions League last 16 in 2017/18 before winning three back-to-back Serie A titles with Juventus, in addition to lifting the Supercoppa Italiana twice and the Coppa Italia twice. He is also a two-time Argentina Primera Division winner and an Argentine Cup winner with his previous club, Boca Juniors. What does he hope to bring to our squad?
“I would say I’m a very tactical player who covers free spaces, does well when winning the ball back and moves it forward quickly,” he explained. “I also think I have scope to improve even more and I can do so as part of this team at Spurs.
“I am looking forward to learning from Antonio Conte – I think he’s a great coach, he wants to win and gets 150 per cent out of his players. I think he’ll make me improve even more, both mentally and as a player. I like that, and it’s a big motivation for me.”
