Rumor Roundup: Tottenham Hotspur Women linked to Beth England, Nikita Parris, Jill Scott

BBC Journalist Emma Sanders has reported that Tottenham Hotspur Women are interested in a number of high profile players, including Beth England, Nikita Parris, and Jill Scott. It’s early days, but this looks like a really, really promising start.

Sanders reports that multiple clubs are interested in Bethany England, and that Tottenham are prepared to pay a fee to get her. Beth England is a top striker and proven goal scorer, and Chelsea manager Emma Hayes once referred to the 27-year-old as, “the best No. 9 in the country.” In a star-studded Chelsea squad with the likes of Sam Kerr, Pernille Harder, Guro Reiten and Fran Kirby, you can see why England might want a guarantee of more minutes and a chance to be the focal point of an attack. In the past, Spurs have almost entirely picked up young, unproven players who were out of contract. Going for a player like Beth England and committing to paying a fee is a huge departure from that, and it’s exactly the kind of ambition we want to see.

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Both Spurs and Manchester United are reportedly interested in winger Nikita Parris, who found opportunities in her first season at Arsenal hard to come by. There’s also interest in Manchester City’s decorated box-to-box midfielder Jill Scott. Scott nearly joined Spurs on loan in January, but went to Aston Villa instead as City reportedly considered us direct competition for Champions League spots. Villa are also interested in making her loan permanent. Closer to home, Sanders says that Spurs have offered a new short term contract to Rachel Williams amidst interest from other teams, and that Josie Green could depart for Leicester.

Photo by Tottenham Hotspur FC/Tottenham Hotspur FC via Getty Images

As for our general plans this summer, Sanders says Spurs Women will be in the market for some attacking firepower and fullback depth. This basically lines up with what we’ve seen this season—a strong defensive team in desperate need of sharp attackers. We’ve tied down our starting fullbacks with new contracts, but bringing in reinforcements will allow us to rotate both personnel and tactics, and give us more cover while we continue to develop young players like Asmita Ale and Esther Morgan.

For years, we’ve been saying it would only take about a week of Joe Hart, Harry Winks, or bench-warmer-du-jour’s wages to make our women’s team one of the best in the country. If these rumors are anything to go by, it might finally be happening! The signs are positive, but we’ll obviously need to wait until the end of the summer to really count our chickens. In the meantime, I’m just having fun engaging with real Spurs Women transfer rumors for once, and I’m excited to see what happens next!

Here’s the rest of Emma Sanders’ transfer round up. Are there any other players you’d like to see Tottenham consider?