Tottenham Women sign France midfielder Clemaron, Finnish keeper Korpela

Days after the permanent signing of South Korea captain Cho So-hyun and the appointment of Vicky Jepson as the club’s new assistant head coach, Tottenham Hotspur Women continue to add to their squad. Today they announced the signing of 28-year old France international midfielder Maeva Clemaron, as well as Finnish keeper Tinja-Riikka Korpela, both from Everton and bothon one-year contracts with options for a second year.

One of the biggest issues Tottenham had last season was in its midfield, which got overrun frequently and was not a very good link between the defense and the attack. The attackers had their own issues — Spurs just couldn’t put the ball into the net — but it becomes a lot harder to score if you don’t get good service.

I’m not going to pretend that I’ve watched a ton of Everton Women this past season, but Clemaron’s stats on FBRef.com show her to be a ball-winning and tackling midfielder, something that Spurs really could use a lot more of this year. In her statement on Spurs’ website, Clemaron said that Spurs manager Rehanne Skinner sold her on the project happening right now at Tottenham.

“The most important thing for me was the project that the Club proposed to me and the objectives that Rehanne Skinner has explained, with her visions for the team going into the future. The opportunity to play for Spurs is a really good one and a great challenge for me. Spurs are progressing well and will only get better and better on the pitch, so I’m very excited to join and work with everyone in order to help the Club reach its targets.”

She also has her very own YouTube hype video! Check it out.

Korpela is ostensibly coming in as a backup for Becky Spencer, replacing the outgoing Aurora Mikalsen. She was a backup at Everton last season after starting regularly the season before, and will probably the same role at Spurs. Her stats show her to be an exceptional shot-stopper albeit under limited minutes. She has 98 caps for Finland and will be an good set of hands should Spencer miss out on any time due to injury.

Spurs manager Skinner praised Korpela’s international experience on Tottenham’s website:

“We’re really pleased to have ‘Tinni’ with us. She has gained a significant amount of experience both domestically and internationally, and played a huge part in Finland’s qualification for the Euros next year, which is very exciting for them. She is a hard-working, diligent professional who has played in different countries, enabling her to bring a breadth of experience and knowledge to her game. She’s going to add some strong competition to our goalkeeping department and we’re excited to have her on board.”

Spurs still have a lot of work to do ahead of the new season after releasing a raft of players last spring. With the additions of Korpela and Clemaron, Spurs still only have 14 senior players on the roster, so we can probably expect a number of signings yet to come. They’ll need to be good players if Tottenham want to improve their disappointing league standing from last season.