Tottenham confirms Pierluigi Gollini, youth team departures

Tottenham Hotspur just confirmed its first departure of the offseason. As widely expected, Italian reserve goalkeeper Pierluigi Gollini has left the club and returned to Atalanta at the conclusion of his season-long loan to Spurs.

Gollini was brought in ostensibly to back up Hugo Lloris for a season before possibly taking over for him in goal. But it didn’t take long for him to fall out of favor at Spurs — in his rare appearances Gollini looked out of his depth between the sticks, and made a number of notable mistakes that didn’t exactly endear him to the Tottenham faithful.

Which is too bad, because by all indications he was a model teammate, gregarious and popular in the dressing room. A lot of the players seemed to like having him around. I get that, and it’s important. But it’s usually not enough. Gollini’s departure makes way for the signing of Fraser Forster, late of Southampton — that deal is reportedly signed, sealed, and delivered, but not yet announced. Forster, who is both English and home grown, will officially join the club on July 1.

Elsewhere, Tottenham confirmed the departure of several members of its academy as well as recent graduates who have yet to make the first team.

We can also confirm the departures of Development Squad players J’Neil Bennett, Kacper Kurylowicz, Dermi Lusala, Thimothee Lo-Tutala, Josh Oluwayemi, Tobi Omole and Isak Solberg following the conclusion of their contracts.

Under-18s players Jez Davies, Jordan Hackett, Khalon Haysman, Renaldo Torraj and Oliver Turner have also departed following the conclusion of their scholarships.

The most notable name on that list is probably J’Neil Bennett, officially the first player to score in the new Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, and a name you should remember for an obscure bit of Spurs trivia. My sense was he had shown some promise when he was younger but apparently not enough to keep around, unless he purposefully ran down his contract. Thimothee Lo-Tutala was another promising young goalkeeper whom I’m also surprised to see on this list, while Tobi Omole trained with the first team last season was actually listed on the Europa Conference League roster in order to make up the homegrown numbers. Kacper Kurylowicz and Isak Solberg were also released, making it a very bad day to be a Tottenham Hotspur academy goalkeeper.