When he was at Tottenham and wasn’t playing, many Spurs fans felt like Tanguy Ndombele was happy with his role of just being a substitute.
That stemmed from him appearing sluggish whenever he was called upon, and ultimately led to Antonio Conte not wanting him around.
The Tottenham midfielder was sent to Lyon for the second half of last season before returning to Spurs, who then found him a new temporary landing spot in Naples.
There was hope the Frenchman would be able to get back on track under Luciano Spalletti, and while his start in Italy wasn’t the most impressive, he’s starting to turn things around.
In fact, it appears the mentality throughout the squad in Naples has even turned the Tottenham loanee into a new person, with Gazzetta dello Sport pointing out he is ‘the most important example’ of this.
They write that while he ‘found himself on the bench’, he ‘discovered a really strong Napoli’, where ‘whoever enters the field always wants to prove something’.
Compared to what he was like at Tottenham, he is now ‘taking advantage of every minute on the pitch by attacking the game and putting his quality into it’.
This is certainly what Spurs will have wanted, as they included an option to buy for Napoli to take advantage of if they so wished.
While we’re not quite there yet, if Ndombélé continues to impress as a substitute, he could end up making his way into the starting line up and, who knows, maybe even force the Serie A side to spend money on him?
