Thomas Frank issues Destiny Udogie Tottenham injury update and makes Richarlison plan clear

Thomas Frank has revealed that Tottenham's match against Manchester City on Saturday has just come too soon for Destiny Udogie to return. The left-back has not featured since Spurs' first pre-season game at Reading due to a knee injury.

Udogie sustained the issue the following week while warming up for the friendly at Luton Town and he was subsequently not included in the squad for the tour of Hong Kong and Singapore. The Italian international will have to wait to make his comeback and the same goes for Yves Bissouma, who missed out last week against Burnley due to an injury sustained in training.

"Destiny is better. He's trained with the team twice, full trainings, and also other trainings. Just too short to be involved for City," outlined the head coach in his pre-match press conference. "We want him to train tomorrow and have another good week next week as well, but he's in a good place. Looks very positive about him.

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"Biss will miss this game as well. [Dejan] Kulusevski's out. I think that's a longer one. I don't want to put a timeframe on it."

It appears that Richarlison will once again be leading the line for Tottenham after his excellent double against Burnley. The Brazilian was this week linked with a surprise move to Crystal Palace as part of a deal for Eberechi Eze but Frank has stated that he wants to keep the attacker in N17.

"Right now he's my starting nine," confessed the Dane. "Scored two fantastic goals, he had two top games, he's the Brazilian No.9. He is a very good player so I'm very happy with him.

"Richy wants to stay, I want to keep him, there's been no talks about anything else. He's done well for us."

Amid Tottenham's search for a new No.10, Frank knows he has options and he pointed to the team scoring three goals last weekend.

"We just played the first game and scored three goals so I think that was pretty promising," he said. "I know it's a long season and we need enough players and players with different abilities.

"I think in some of the players we have, [Mohammed] Kudus has got that spark and creativity. Wilson [Odobert] does very well, I think Mathys Tel can play different positions. We've got two good strikers in Dom [Solanke] and Richy and then Brennan [Johnson] the deep runner.

"I think we've got variation up the pitch. But again we look out there and if there is anything that can strengthen it and that is in all areas then we are open for it."