Tottenham Hotspur lost 3-0 to RB Leipzig in the second-leg of their Champions League last-16 clash last night, crashing out of the competition after suffering a 4-0 defeat on aggregate.
One of the few positives from the game was seeing Malachi Fagan-Walcott make his professional debut for Spurs, with the 18-year-old replacing Serge Aurier in the closing minutes of the game.
Fagan-Walcott wasn’t supposed to be in the matchday squad originally, but an injury to Davinson Sanchez saw boss Jose Mourinho hand him a chance.
While the teenager only made a cameo appearance against Leipzig, that the Portuguese trusted him enough to hand him a debut speaks volume.
The Tottenham academy graduate was gutted with the result but is happy to have fulfilled a dream, and he has taken to Twitter to react to making his debut:
It’s was a night of mixed emotions, extremely disappointed to be knocked out of the champions league with such a great team, but on a positive note happy to have made my professional debut in the champions league. Proud moment for me and my family 🙌🏾❤️ pic.twitter.com/jfhpcKhJ3i
— malachi Fagan-Walcott (@MalachiWalcott5) March 11, 2020
Yesterday was Fagan-Walcott’s very first time in a Spurs’ matchday squad, and he will hope to earn permanent promotion to the first-team very soon.
The 18-year-old has already trained with Mourinho’s men a few times this term, and he was part of Monday’s training session before the squad left for Germany.
Fagan-Walcott is a youth product of Norsemen FC, joining Tottenham’s academy in 2015 before signing his first professional contract with the club in July 2018.
He has impressed in the Premier League 2, the UEFA Youth League and the FA Youth Cup with the youth team this term, and while he is primarily a centre-back, his pace means the one-time district 200m sprint champion can also play at right-back, and it will be interesting to see if he can keep impressing Mourinho enough to get regular playing minutes going forward.
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