Tottenham’s Dilan Markanday wins PL2 Player of the Month

Move over, Troy Parrott. Step aside, Dane Scarlett. There’s a new hype train leaving the station. Dilan Markanday is the latest Tottenham Hotspur U23 forward to generate some buzz among the fanbase, and he now has a shiny new trophy to go along with it. Yesterday, the club announced that Markanday won the Premier League 2 Player of the Month award for October.

Markanday, 20, has been quietly impressing in Spurs’ academy over the past few seasons, but this year he’s come out absolutely on fire. He scored five goals in four matches in the month of October and is currently sitting on ten goals for the season. Nuno Espirito Santo also gave Markanday his club debut as a late substitute in Spurs’ away loss at Vitesse, and he is the first male British Asian and first footballer of Indian descent to play a first team match at Tottenham.

We love to hype young players at Cartilage Free Captain — in fact, it’s almost a tradition here to hitch our wagons to whoever is the new hotness coming out of the academy. In truth, it’s unlikely that Markanday is going to make an impact in Spurs’ first team anytime soon. For starters, despite the hot start he’s probably just not ready for Premier League football yet, and he’s also not a great fit for Antonio Conte’s tactics. Conte prefers strikers who can run in from behind, and Markanday is much more comfortable with the ball at his feet, even though he’s typically deployed as a wide forward. He’s also not the tallest dude, and at 5’10” he has more in common with Jermain Defoe than Harry Kane.

That’s not to say he’s not an important prospect, or that he can’t grow into a role at Spurs, but it’s much more likely that he heads off on loan here in the short to medium term to gain first team experience. And that’s if he stays at all — his contract expires in June and there are murmurs that he’s considering his options and might decide to move somewhere else where he has a better chance of breaking through.

That’d be a shame, but he’d not be the first player to leave Spurs for what look like greener pastures. In the meantime, we should keep an eye on this kid, because he certainly does look like he has that je ne sais quoi and also is scoring goals by the bucketload at the moment.