Player Watch: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

[Lenn0n]

Looking at the way the club have presented Hojbjerg - they are doing more than usual to show what type of person he is. In pure footballing terms he looks good rather than outstanding (hence the relatively low transfer fee)........the assumption is that he contributes in terms of attitude and drive. His influence will also be about how he improves the players around him. He looks like a team player rather than a star player. We need a blend of 'team' and star players. So hopefully a brilliant team player..

 

[Marty]

Hojbjerg: The outspoken, trophy-hungry leader Spurs have been looking for?

Hojbjerg was tipped to be a star after joining Bayern at 16 but the new Tottenham midfielder's life and career since then have not been easy

theathletic.com

I'm on my phone and it's a very long article so won't make an attempt to cut and paste yet but this is a fantastic long read on Højbjerg.

 

[THOWIG]

It is really good.

 

[wiggo24]

Hojbjerg: The outspoken, trophy-hungry leader Spurs have been looking for?

Hojbjerg was tipped to be a star after joining Bayern at 16 but the new Tottenham midfielder's life and career since then have not been easy

theathletic.com

I'm on my phone and it's a very long article so won't make an attempt to cut and paste yet but this is a fantastic long read on Højbjerg.

Yeah please do copy and paste when you get the chance!

Been really impressed with the Athletic since lockdown started, from what I've seen (had copied to me) they've had some excellent profiles. Might have to finally take the hit and subscribe ?

 

[Led's Zeppelin]

For those who can remember, he strikes me as a bit of a Steve Perryman sort of player.

And for those who can’t remember, that’s a good thing.

 

[Everlasting Seconds]

For those who can remember, he strikes me as a bit of a Steve Perryman sort of player.

And for those who can’t remember, that’s a good thing.

Class act he was. Didn't see him as a player, but I met him when I was a kid on a random rainy winter day outside the old stadium when he was a caretaker. Chatted with me as if we'd been best friends forever.

 

[spursfan77]

Yeah please do copy and paste when you get the chance!

Been really impressed with the Athletic since lockdown started, from what I've seen (had copied to me) they've had some excellent profiles. Might have to finally take the hit and subscribe ?

it's probably worth it. I did it when they had money off but I cant remember how much I paid for it. As they do money off deals a few times a year I'd probably wait until then though if you can.

 

[Marty]

Hojbjerg: The outspoken, trophy-hungry leader Spurs have been looking for?

Hojbjerg was tipped to be a star after joining Bayern at 16 but the new Tottenham midfielder's life and career since then have not been easy

theathletic.com

I'm on my phone and it's a very long article so won't make an attempt to cut and paste yet but this is a fantastic long read on Højbjerg.

It's such a long read it surpasses the character limit so I'll split it up and spoiler it.

Spoiler: Long read part one

In a leaked clip from the Amazon’s forthcoming All Or Nothing documentary on Tottenham Hotspur, Jose Mourinho informed his players that, for 90 minutes, he needed them to be “intelligent c****”.
“Bastards, in the sense you are going to win matches,” he continued.
The point was that too often this season, and in the last few years, Spurs have been either “too nice” (to borrow another Mourinho phrase) or, as he went on to say in that leaked Amazon clip, “stupid c****” — like in their famous Battle Of The Bridge meltdown in 2016.
Step forward then, Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg, who joined Tottenham on Tuesday for a fee of around £17 million. Hojbjerg is a very smart individual on and off the pitch, and has the nastiness when required to put in the tactical fouls that too often last season Spurs failed to make (research by The Athletic in June showed that their tactical fouling in 2019-20 was way down on previous seasons). When they were together at Bayern Munich, Pep Guardiola even thought Hojbjerg could be the next Sergio Busquets — surely the GOAT when it comes to intelligent c****.
An obstacle to Hojbjerg attaining that kind of status previously was a lack of discipline — in 2018-19, he picked up two red cards and eight yellows for Southampton. But he has worked at that side of the game and last season was more cute as he picked up a reduced five yellow cards and no reds.
Hojbjerg has an edge to him, but he is also determined to bring out the best in those around him. This is something he has worked on with his trusted life mentor — more on that later — and reiterated upon joining Tottenham. “I love to be the best team player I can be and I like to make people better, I like to make the team better,” he said on Tuesday.
He is, according to multiple sources in his native Denmark a “born leader”, who at just 23 was made Southampton captain. Those leadership skills have been lacking in the Spurs dressing room and are part of the reason Mourinho was so keen to get him.
An emotionally literate individual who has spoken extremely movingly about the death of his father Christian from stomach cancer six years ago, Hojbjerg is a very interesting character as well as an accomplished midfielder.
“Especially with the stereotype of modern-day footballers often speaking in cliches and saying something but not really saying something, he is always very honest and open,” says Mikkel Rathsach, a Danish journalist for outlets including Eurosport.
Another source who has watched Hojbjerg’s career closely adds: “As much as his football, the fact that he is so honest and open-hearted about his feelings, like when he cried on TV (in 2015), that is why he has become a household name in Denmark.”
Those tears, following a win over Serbia in a European Championship qualifier, are an important part of Hojbjerg’s narrative arc — a tale that features personal tragedy, a journey of discovery and then redemption.
This is his story, and how he ended up at Spurs.
Hojbjerg’s move to Tottenham was the culmination of months of offers and counter-offers.
The midfielder was also wanted by Everton, Monaco and Ajax, but opted for Spurs despite being offered higher wages elsewhere — including at Goodison Park. Tottenham are understood to have been his number-one choice throughout the process — partly due to the size of the club and their outstanding stadium and facilities, and partly a consequence of wanting to work with Mourinho, who he has admired since watching football in Copenhagen as a young boy.
Hojbjerg also checked in with compatriot and former Tottenham midfielder Christian Eriksen and was told nothing but good things about the club. He is convinced he can win silverware with Spurs and is, to borrow a phrase of his from a 2018 interview with The Guardian, “horny for trophies”. Switching to superagent Pini Zahavi in February meanwhile was viewed at the time as an important step to helping him secure the best possible move. Upon making it clear he wanted to leave for north London, Hojbjerg was stripped of the Southampton captaincy in June.
Having turned 25 last week, joining a club of Tottenham’s size caps a hugely satisfying period in Hojbjerg’s career — one that, after starting to much fanfare at Bayern, looked to be veering off course. Spurs, meanwhile, have been crying out for a ball-winning central midfielder for some time, while also lacking natural leaders. Hojbjerg ticks both boxes.
His journey to this point began in the affluent, pastel-coloured Copenhagen neighbourhood of Osterbro where Hojbjerg, whose father was an anthropology professor, fell in love with the sport by playing street football. Son of a French mother, Hojbjerg’s favourite player growing up was Zinedine Zidane — and as a 10-year-old he wept when his idol was sent off in the 2006 World Cup final.
Hojbjerg enjoyed the way street football brought people from different cultures and backgrounds together, and it was during this period that he became close with Yussuf Poulsen, who is now a team-mate for Denmark and was part of the RB Leipzig squad that eliminated Tottenham from the Champions League in March. The pair also linked up as youngsters at their first club, BK Skjold, a lower-league outfit in Copenhagen that Hojbjerg joined while at primary school.
Playing for Skjold was where Hojbjerg first displayed some of the attributes that set him apart from his peers. “He was a really good kid, and just loved to play football,” Thomas Jensen, who coached Hojbjerg at Skjold from the age of 10, tells The Athletic. “He always had a ball under his arm, and if he didn’t play with us then he would play at the park or at school.

“He got on well with the other boys, and also played with the kids from his school. He just loved to play.
“He was clearly a good player with strong technique. I remember even when he was very small he could kick the ball so hard.”
It was his attitude though, his “coachability” that really stood out. “He was willing to be taught a lot of things, and always wanted to learn,” remembers Jensen.
While at Skjold, Hojbjerg played as a central midfielder, a forward and even at right-back, with his impressive performances making a move to a bigger club inevitable. He duly joined FC Copenhagen, but it was here that another of Hojbjerg’s characteristics came to the fore: his stubbornness. He was only 14 but Hojbjerg became infuriated at being asked to play up front and forced his way out of the club. “I was mentally no longer there — the whole athlete in me had been lost,” he reflected in 2013.
To ram home the point about how headstrong Hojbjerg can be, even as a teenager, he then went to Brondby — Copenhagen’s arch-rivals, the equivalent of swapping Spurs for Arsenal. Despite suffering a crisis of confidence while at Brondby, the move generally worked out very well and his performances at youth level earned him a move to Bayern, aged 16, in 2012.
Perhaps unsurprising for someone who thinks so deeply, Hojbjerg initially doubted himself and suffered from imposter syndrome. He called his agent and asked, “Am I really right here?” Granted the reassurances he needed, Hojbjerg kicked on and as a 17-year-old in April 2013 became the youngest player ever to appear for Bayern in the Bundesliga.

A few months earlier, he had come on as a substitute in a mid-season friendly in Qatar against fellow Germans Schalke — a game Bayern, who went on to win the treble that season, won 5-0. Those who were there say he did not look out of place.
“He came on in the second half, was only 17, and he was playing absolutely great,” recalls Thomas Spiegel, who was working in the Schalke media department at the time. “He held his own with that great team, including players like (Philipp) Lahm and (David) Alaba. You thought, ‘He’s at their level’. I thought he would be a star for Bayern.”
His new manager that summer, Guardiola, shared Spiegel’s view, and according to Marti Perarnau’s 2014 book Pep Confidential, “thought that he may just have found the Busquets of Bayern”.
It was at this point though that tragedy struck for Hojbjerg. He and his dad Christian had always been extremely close but fell out shortly before Hojbjerg turned 18 in August 2013, with his father feeling he was letting his elevated status at Bayern go to his head. Arguments were not uncommon between the two, but on this occasion, the pair didn’t speak for a few weeks.
During that time, Hojbjerg picked up an ankle injury that required him to wear a cast, and while he was convalescing his phone lit up. It was his dad.
“The phone is quiet and I say, ‘Hello?’ No one answers, and I go, ‘Hello?’” Hojbjerg recalled last year — in an extraordinarily open interview on the Nordic Entertainment Group’s Sat Af programme.
“Then I hear a tearful voice saying, ‘It’s your dad.’ He says, ‘I’m ill.’ I say, ‘What’s up?’ He says, ‘I have cancer.’ I remember I start crying, but I take the phone away.
“I’m so sad but I take the phone away and I hear him say something. So I try to hold it in. Everything crashes, I can’t even describe it. You feel angry but sad at the time and you want things to happen. You think, ‘What can we do?’ You also get very scared.
“Because suddenly, it’s life or death. And then it suddenly snowballed.”
Hojbjerg received great support from Bayern, including from Guardiola and club president Uli Hoeness. But he resolved to try to look after his dad himself and promised Christian he would pay for him to come to Germany to have the chemotherapy. “You have to imagine: he lands and has lost weight and has no strength left in him. He then hugs me and says, ‘I don’t want to die.’ So I have to stay strong in the middle of an airport, and stand up and tell him, ‘That’s not going to happen because we will fight this together.’
Hojbjerg couldn’t actually afford all of the treatments and so “fought like a maniac” to get fit again and make the few appearances for the first team he needed to earn the bonuses required to pay for them.
He ended up making nine first-team appearances that season, including starting the German Cup final win over Jurgen Klopp’s Borussia Dortmund — shining on the right of midfield alongside Toni Kroos and Arjen Robben.
Just three weeks earlier, his father had passed away.

Running on adrenaline, Hojbjerg initially found himself able to cope. But as the months passed, it became harder and harder, and after a disagreement with Guardiola over his lack of playing time, he was loaned to Augsburg for the second half of the 2014-15 season. It was not the first or last time the principled Hojbjerg has clashed with a manager.
He was loaned out again for the following season, to Schalke, where, to continue the theme, he did not always see eye to eye with manager Andre Breitenreiter. It was an up and down season for Schalke, who ended up just missing out on Champions League qualification after a strong start. Hojbjerg played in 30 games in all competitions but made little impression on the pitch.
Off it, though, he is remembered fondly at the Veltins Arena, with his maturity and focus standing out. “He was only 20 when he joined but I had to check that this age was right because of how mature and highly rated he was,” says Spiegel, the former Schalke press officer.
“Even at 20, he understood the game and what might get you in hot water. Some players at that age would only use cliches and be worried about getting in trouble, whereas he was more mature and, in my mind, more like 23. He spoke his mind but knew the boundaries.”
Spiegel was also struck by how Hojbjerg was able to put aside the recent tragedy in his personal life and focus on his football: “I spoke to a colleague who told me that his father died of cancer and that he faced very difficult circumstances in his private life. I thought it was remarkable because, when he joined Schalke, you would never have guessed that he was dealing with something like this. He was always friendly, had a nice joke when you met up. You wouldn’t have thought he had to deal with such difficult circumstances. Maybe it contributed to him not playing that well.
“He was very good to deal with — not a bubbly person exactly, but was always reasonable and would listen to you. He was very thoughtful, he would always be reading something. Everyone wished him well at the end of the season.”
But as much as Hojbjerg could give the impression of coping with the loss of his father, inside he was still processing what had happened. And when he played for the national team, the emotions often poured out.
In what turned out to be their final conversation, dad Christian pointed from his hospital bed to the nearby stadium that stages Denmark home games and told his son: “You have to play for the national team as well. Then you’ve done well.”
“That’s why, when I got to Parken (Denmark’s stadium) with the national team, there was something extra,” Hojbjerg said on the Sat Af programme. “Where the grief hit me the most was when I scored my first goal for the national team (against Armenia in September 2014). If I could share that with anyone in the world, it would be my father. One person, for just one second. A high-five, a hug, and that’s it. In that moment.

“And my stomach hurt so bad, and I felt really sick. I couldn’t enjoy it. I couldn’t enjoy it in the weeks and months that followed. I couldn’t relax and just enjoy it. I swallowed a lot of stones and all of a sudden they piled up.”
In June 2015, meanwhile, after a Euros qualifying win over Serbia, Hojbjerg gave a tearful post-match interview that thrust him into the nation’s consciousness. “In that moment, everyone could see his passion — he’s very in touch with his emotions and not afraid to talk about them,” says journalist Mikkel Rathsach.

 

[Marty]

Spoiler: Long read part two

Hojbjerg’s determination to understand his emotions better saw him link up with Kim Boye, a former footballer turned author and life coach who the midfielder describes as his “life mentor”.
Boye worked with Hojbjerg on putting his pride to one side and trying to make him more open to new ideas. He also encouraged him to focus on building up his team-mates’ confidence while at the same time challenging them, as Jose Mourinho wants at Tottenham, when required. “He doesn’t say, ‘Go to the others and kiss their asses’. I’m not like that. That’s not me, but it’s about creating a team spirit where you really help build each other,” Hojbjerg said last year.
“You create a team spirit where you push each other, but you also build each other up.” As one of Hojbjerg’s many tattoos states, “Iron sharpens iron”.
Hojbjerg’s openness about his mental health was applauded in his homeland, and some fellow players have followed him in working with a professional on the psychological aspect of their lives.
Others following Hojbjerg has been a recurring theme throughout his career. “Born leader” is a term you hear again and again when talking to people who know him, and at Southampton, who he joined in from Bayern in July 2016 when Claude Puel was manager, this was especially evident.
Having been sidelined by Puel’s successor Mauricio Pellegrino (during which time he became close with the briefly-exiled Virgil van Dijk), Hojbjerg fought his way back into the team under Mark Hughes and was then named captain by Ralph Hasenhuttl after he succeeded the Welshman in December 2018. “He is a great leader. If I didn’t know how old he was, I definitely wouldn’t say he is 23 years old,“ goalkeeper Angus Gunn said the following April.

With Denmark, Hojbjerg is the same — and team-mates remember being struck by his willingness to bark instructions at players far older and more experienced than him.
As Southampton skipper, Hojbjerg endeavoured to apply the leadership principles he had worked on with his life mentor. Last year he said: “The greatest acknowledgement I got in football was being made captain. Because at one point there was some talk about me having a bad attitude and not being a team player — I had trouble fitting in on a team. A year later, I get the recognition where I work every day. I am told that I, not only as a player but as a person, have the ability to handle a dressing room.
“I can help make decisions and take responsibility.”
At Tottenham, where Mourinho wants his players to show leadership and be decisive, this will be extremely valuable. And you get the sense the similarly spiky Portuguese will be a better fit for Hojbjerg than some of his previous managers.
With Denmark, for instance, Hojbjerg has not always been appreciated. There was a perception of him as arrogant, which goes against the Scandinavian principle of ‘Janteloven’ that emphasises staying humble and putting the collective first. It’s tough to imagine a manager who once described himself as a ‘Special One’ resenting Hojbjerg for having a bit of self-confidence.
Not that Hojbjerg has always helped himself — he was dropped by Denmark for two years, for instance, after reacting angrily to being substituted in a 1-0 loss to Montenegro in October 2016. But some there feel this ties into the idea that Hojbjerg has never quite fitted the national mould of always remaining modest and quiet. Even the slight French twang in his voice makes him sound different to his compatriots.
Conforming has never been in Hojbjerg’s nature. At Southampton, he became known for a relentless focus that often meant he was the last to leave the club’s Staplewood training centre. He is considered to be extremely serious and intense in training, which will go down well with Mourinho, who places a lot of importance on the way his players train and motivate others.
Hojbjerg is also an outlier in that, for years, he did not use social media, and only joined Instagram last September. “I just wanted to fly below the radar,” he explained. “I was more present with those close to me… I actually did it because I was like, ‘Fuck this.’ I don’t think I’m the type of guy who would take a selfie with a team-mate or something. I’m more into being present. It sounds like a cliche but seriously, I don’t feel the need for it.”
He does have a more lighthearted side, though. Rathsach recalls being sent to interview Southampton’s Danish defender Jannik Vestergaard, and then hearing Hojbjerg jokingly shouting from inside the training centre, “Why don’t you want to interview me?”
During that Sat Af interview, meanwhile, Hojbjerg said of his build: “I’m a compact guy — big thighs, big ass, big…”
Well, you get the idea.
The four years he spent at Southampton saw Hojbjerg develop considerably as a player and a person. Starting with the former, the view in Denmark is that he has realised where his strengths lie and that is largely in playing as a more deep-lying midfielder.
“When I started as a senior I wasn’t the best in defence, and didn’t put my all into tackling and winning the ball back,” Hojbjerg himself said last year. “Now, when I see my stats, some of my best, besides passing it, are actually interceptions and ball recovery.

“(My best position) is about what type of match it is. If it’s an open match I’d say No 8. If it’s more closed, I like to move back and set up the play.”
Hojbjerg has worked hard on his positional discipline and tried to cut out the red cards that, earlier in his Southampton career, marked him out as a bit of a hothead.
Off the pitch, the birth of daughter Rosa in September 2017 was a transformative moment — one that provided redemption after the death of his father. “Fast forward a few years when my daughter is born and I finally feel that life is giving something back to me,” he said on the Sat Af programme last year.
“I could smile again and enjoy again. Before that, I was able to enjoy myself, I had good moments. But for the first time since my father died I said to myself, ‘Wow, life is actually great. Life really can be great.’
“I cried like a baby, tears were streaming.”
Two years after Rosa arrived, Hojbjerg told the Southampton official website: “The emotional management in my life and in my career has been really progressing, because I work a lot on it.” Earlier this summer, Hojbjerg’s wife, Josephine, gave birth to the couple’s second child, Theo.
Having found contentment off the pitch, he will look to take a major step in his professional career over the next couple of years. Some in Denmark are sceptical, with one source saying, “Is Hojbjerg the player Spurs need to finish in the top four? I’m not sure,” before questioning whether he has the discipline to be an elite-level defensive midfielder.

Much will depend on how well he is coached by Mourinho and his staff, and how he copes with the greater scrutiny on his performances than there was at Southampton. For every Victor Wanyama who excelled, albeit briefly, after leaving St Mary’s for a bigger club, there’s a Morgan Schneiderlin who did not.
However things pan out, Hojbjerg will try to deal with it philosophically — another of his tattoos says that the journey is more important than the destination.
With the new season less than a month away, we’ll soon get our first impressions of Hojbjerg in a Tottenham shirt. Before then though, he is expected to return to the Parken Stadium to play in Denmark’s Nations League match against England on September 8. As ever it will stir up a range of emotions — including for those watching him.
“Yes, I’ll be watching,” says Thomas Jensen, his coach at first club Skjold. “I always feel very proud when I see him playing at the Parken Stadium.”

 

[Led's Zeppelin]

Class act he was. Didn't see him as a player, but I met him when I was a kid on a random rainy winter day outside the old stadium when he was a caretaker. Chatted with me as if we'd been best friends forever.

As a youngster, he was my hero.

I wanted to be like Greaves or Hoddle but knew I never could be. But I thought if I worked hard enough I could be like Stevie P.

If only!

 

[teok]

Great article.

 

[matthew.absurdum]

Spoiler: Long read part two

Hojbjerg’s determination to understand his emotions better saw him link up with Kim Boye, a former footballer turned author and life coach who the midfielder describes as his “life mentor”.
Boye worked with Hojbjerg on putting his pride to one side and trying to make him more open to new ideas. He also encouraged him to focus on building up his team-mates’ confidence while at the same time challenging them, as Jose Mourinho wants at Tottenham, when required. “He doesn’t say, ‘Go to the others and kiss their asses’. I’m not like that. That’s not me, but it’s about creating a team spirit where you really help build each other,” Hojbjerg said last year.
“You create a team spirit where you push each other, but you also build each other up.” As one of Hojbjerg’s many tattoos states, “Iron sharpens iron”.
Hojbjerg’s openness about his mental health was applauded in his homeland, and some fellow players have followed him in working with a professional on the psychological aspect of their lives.
Others following Hojbjerg has been a recurring theme throughout his career. “Born leader” is a term you hear again and again when talking to people who know him, and at Southampton, who he joined in from Bayern in July 2016 when Claude Puel was manager, this was especially evident.
Having been sidelined by Puel’s successor Mauricio Pellegrino (during which time he became close with the briefly-exiled Virgil van Dijk), Hojbjerg fought his way back into the team under Mark Hughes and was then named captain by Ralph Hasenhuttl after he succeeded the Welshman in December 2018. “He is a great leader. If I didn’t know how old he was, I definitely wouldn’t say he is 23 years old,“ goalkeeper Angus Gunn said the following April.

With Denmark, Hojbjerg is the same — and team-mates remember being struck by his willingness to bark instructions at players far older and more experienced than him.
As Southampton skipper, Hojbjerg endeavoured to apply the leadership principles he had worked on with his life mentor. Last year he said: “The greatest acknowledgement I got in football was being made captain. Because at one point there was some talk about me having a bad attitude and not being a team player — I had trouble fitting in on a team. A year later, I get the recognition where I work every day. I am told that I, not only as a player but as a person, have the ability to handle a dressing room.
“I can help make decisions and take responsibility.”
At Tottenham, where Mourinho wants his players to show leadership and be decisive, this will be extremely valuable. And you get the sense the similarly spiky Portuguese will be a better fit for Hojbjerg than some of his previous managers.
With Denmark, for instance, Hojbjerg has not always been appreciated. There was a perception of him as arrogant, which goes against the Scandinavian principle of ‘Janteloven’ that emphasises staying humble and putting the collective first. It’s tough to imagine a manager who once described himself as a ‘Special One’ resenting Hojbjerg for having a bit of self-confidence.
Not that Hojbjerg has always helped himself — he was dropped by Denmark for two years, for instance, after reacting angrily to being substituted in a 1-0 loss to Montenegro in October 2016. But some there feel this ties into the idea that Hojbjerg has never quite fitted the national mould of always remaining modest and quiet. Even the slight French twang in his voice makes him sound different to his compatriots.
Conforming has never been in Hojbjerg’s nature. At Southampton, he became known for a relentless focus that often meant he was the last to leave the club’s Staplewood training centre. He is considered to be extremely serious and intense in training, which will go down well with Mourinho, who places a lot of importance on the way his players train and motivate others.
Hojbjerg is also an outlier in that, for years, he did not use social media, and only joined Instagram last September. “I just wanted to fly below the radar,” he explained. “I was more present with those close to me… I actually did it because I was like, ‘Fuck this.’ I don’t think I’m the type of guy who would take a selfie with a team-mate or something. I’m more into being present. It sounds like a cliche but seriously, I don’t feel the need for it.”
He does have a more lighthearted side, though. Rathsach recalls being sent to interview Southampton’s Danish defender Jannik Vestergaard, and then hearing Hojbjerg jokingly shouting from inside the training centre, “Why don’t you want to interview me?”
During that Sat Af interview, meanwhile, Hojbjerg said of his build: “I’m a compact guy — big thighs, big ass, big…”
Well, you get the idea.
The four years he spent at Southampton saw Hojbjerg develop considerably as a player and a person. Starting with the former, the view in Denmark is that he has realised where his strengths lie and that is largely in playing as a more deep-lying midfielder.
“When I started as a senior I wasn’t the best in defence, and didn’t put my all into tackling and winning the ball back,” Hojbjerg himself said last year. “Now, when I see my stats, some of my best, besides passing it, are actually interceptions and ball recovery.

“(My best position) is about what type of match it is. If it’s an open match I’d say No 8. If it’s more closed, I like to move back and set up the play.”
Hojbjerg has worked hard on his positional discipline and tried to cut out the red cards that, earlier in his Southampton career, marked him out as a bit of a hothead.
Off the pitch, the birth of daughter Rosa in September 2017 was a transformative moment — one that provided redemption after the death of his father. “Fast forward a few years when my daughter is born and I finally feel that life is giving something back to me,” he said on the Sat Af programme last year.
“I could smile again and enjoy again. Before that, I was able to enjoy myself, I had good moments. But for the first time since my father died I said to myself, ‘Wow, life is actually great. Life really can be great.’
“I cried like a baby, tears were streaming.”
Two years after Rosa arrived, Hojbjerg told the Southampton official website: “The emotional management in my life and in my career has been really progressing, because I work a lot on it.” Earlier this summer, Hojbjerg’s wife, Josephine, gave birth to the couple’s second child, Theo.
Having found contentment off the pitch, he will look to take a major step in his professional career over the next couple of years. Some in Denmark are sceptical, with one source saying, “Is Hojbjerg the player Spurs need to finish in the top four? I’m not sure,” before questioning whether he has the discipline to be an elite-level defensive midfielder.

Much will depend on how well he is coached by Mourinho and his staff, and how he copes with the greater scrutiny on his performances than there was at Southampton. For every Victor Wanyama who excelled, albeit briefly, after leaving St Mary’s for a bigger club, there’s a Morgan Schneiderlin who did not.
However things pan out, Hojbjerg will try to deal with it philosophically — another of his tattoos says that the journey is more important than the destination.
With the new season less than a month away, we’ll soon get our first impressions of Hojbjerg in a Tottenham shirt. Before then though, he is expected to return to the Parken Stadium to play in Denmark’s Nations League match against England on September 8. As ever it will stir up a range of emotions — including for those watching him.
“Yes, I’ll be watching,” says Thomas Jensen, his coach at first club Skjold. “I always feel very proud when I see him playing at the Parken Stadium.”

So... he really has a big D...?

 

[DJS]

You need players like this to stop team from being a soft touch.

You can sign all the top attacking players around and we have some really good ones but if they don’t have someone like this to look after them, their games drop.

 

[Gb160]

Just thought I'd add my shit song to the collection of shit songs

Brad and Angelina liked it mate.

 

[TropicalYid]

Im positive. Im guessing Jose wants him to play holding midfield. Breaking up play, protecting the back four.
We have been desperate for a good player in this position for some time.

Now please sign some others. We need backup striker and some full backs

 

[rossdapep]

Some players seem to get unfairly tagged as poor players by fans of their previous club.

Seem to remember Newcastle fans saying Wijnaldum was useless and lived off one game against Norwich.

Fans tend to see the game very differently to coaches which is why I believe Hoejbjerg will be our most important signing in years.

 

[emiley heskey]

Jose Mourinho accused Kia Joorabchian of trying to encourage Arsenal to hijack Tottenham’s deal for Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg, according to the super-agent. Hojbjerg joined Spurs this week as the club’s first summer signing in a deal worth around £15million. The Denmark international signed a five-year contract and Tottenham were always the front-runners for his signature despite interest shown by Everton. But Joorabchian – who is rumoured to have a growing influence on Arsenal’s transfer business – revealed he was confronted by Spurs head coach Mourinho, who believed he was trying to ensure the midfielder ended up at the Emirates.

When a story picks up, it goes. I was talking to Jose after Pierre signed [for Tottenham] and he said, “Ah, you were trying to get him to Arsenal”,’ Joorabchian told talkSPORT when explaining the misconceptions around his involvement at Arsenal.

Jose Mourinho confronted Kia Joorabchian over Arsenal's move for Hojbjerg

Drama!

metro.co.uk

 

[DiVaio]

 

[Teemu]

How was he today?

 

[spursfan77]

How was he today?

Hard to judge because the opposition were so poor but I thought he did well. Won’t pull up too many trees but it’s nice to have a different option in there that isn’t scared of the ball.