Moore strikes late to topple J League champions in Tokyo
Pedro Porro added another goal to his ever-growing Spurs scrapbook as Mikey Moore struck late to beat Vissel Kobe in Tokyo on Saturday.
Indeed, we scored three picturebook goals in overcoming both the heat, humidity and the J League champions in front of over 54,000 fans at Japan’s National Stadium.
Having gone behind early, Porro levelled with a beauty on 17 minutes, providing a clinical finish from a move started deep by Archie Gray and involving Dejan Kulusevski and Brennan Johnson, before Porro glided onto Kulusevski’s flick, stepped inside the last defender and finished.
The Heung-Min Son-Johnson axis bore fruit again to make it 2-1 at the start of the second half before the home side – 24 games into their domestic campaign – drew level on 62 minutes.
We weren’t to be denied though as Academy duo Jamie Donley and Mikey Moore combined four minutes from time, Donley’s cross from the left byline an open invitation for Moore to tap home his second goal of pre-season.
‘He’s earned his spot’ – Postecoglou praises Mikey Moore’s impact in Spurs first-team
Mikey Moore, who has been training with the Tottenham first-team since the end of last season, has been on fire so far this summer, taking part in all three of Spurs’ pre-season friendlies.
The 16-year-old was on target against Hearts earlier this month and added to his pre-season tally with a tap-in against Vissel Kobe in Japan earlier, thanks to a lovely cross from Jamie Donley.
Spurs still have another three pre-season friendlies to play this summer against Bayern Munich (twice) and Team K-League, so Moore will have plenty of chances to impress Postecoglou even further.
Football Insider report that Tottenham are close to agreeing on a new contract with the starlet and are hoping Moore will sign a deal as soon as he turns 17 on August 11.
Ange Postecoglou is clearly impressed with the youngster, telling the press in his post-match interview today (Football London): “Mikey has been fantastic since we brought him in. He’s earned his spot on the roster at the moment — he did at the end of last year.
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“He got a run with the first team because we could see in training that he was handling himself really well and that’s followed through into pre-season training. He’s been good in all the games — he probably should have had three tonight, to be fair — but he did take his goal well by being in the right areas.
“All we can do is keep allowing him to develop. We have to remember that last year he had some injuries and he is only 16, but — yeah — super exciting.
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