Tottenham Women’s Ambition: A Club-Wide Reset for Champions League
Tottenham mean business. You can see it in the cheques they’ve signed, the profiles they’ve targeted, and the way the women’s side now sits at the heart of a wider reset across the club.
Last season’s fifth-place finish in the Women’s Super League was a statement in itself, a sharp turn from the year before when Spurs were glancing nervously over their shoulders at the relegation trapdoor. This summer, the message has hardened: that was the start, not the ceiling.
A record fee and a reshaped spine
The headline move is clear enough. Tottenham broke their club transfer record to prise France defender Alice Sombath from Lyon, only months after spending around £375,000 on Norwegian midfielder Signe Gaupset in January. Two windows, two landmark deals. That is not a club dabbling in the market. That is a club setting a new baseline.
Around those signings, the squad has been rebuilt with a deliberate, almost clinical precision. Forwards Shekiera Martinez and Kirsty Hanson arrive to add goals and aggression in the final third. Caitlin Dijkstra strengthens the back line, Victoria Pelova brings guile and control in midfield, and Selma Panengstuen adds fresh competition in goal.
On paper, it looks like a group capable of unsettling the established order. Inside the club, they believe it can do much more than that.
Seven seasons, one clear direction
This is only Tottenham’s seventh campaign in the top flight, but the trajectory has been steep. Staff numbers have grown. The training environment has shifted from functional to genuinely elite. The women’s team now has its own dedicated base at Hotspur Way, a clear sign of status within the wider operation.
Plans for a new women and girls academy facility hit a legal roadblock this week, blocked in court, yet the broader direction of travel is obvious. Spurs have been steadily building their presence: from hosting almost 40,000 at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium for a north London derby against Arsenal just months after promotion in 2019, to the headline-grabbing arrival of USA star Alex Morgan on a short-term loan in 2020, to reaching the Women’s FA Cup final in 2024.
There have been missteps. A disappointing 2024-25 campaign under Robert Vilahamn cost him his job. But that slump also opened the door to a reset under Martin Ho.
Ho’s 12‑month blueprint
When Ho walked through the door in July 2025, he did not arrive with a short-term fix. Tottenham immediately put a 12‑month recruitment plan in place, mapping three transfer windows and locking in targets early.
Talks with striker Cathinka Tandberg and defender Toko Koga were already advanced before Ho’s contract was even signed. Both arrived in 2025. Both have since become pillars of his team. It set the tone: continuity of planning, regardless of the name on the manager’s office door.
Ho used his first summer to strip the squad back to essentials. What did he have? What did he lack? Only then did the evolution begin in earnest. Those inside the club say that by January they had landed every key target on their list. The same is true of this summer, even with the window open until 3 September.
Crucially, they moved early. Deals were pushed over the line with enough time for Ho to work with a full group throughout pre-season, rather than waiting for late arrivals to drip-feed into the dressing room. For a coach intent on building a clear identity, that matters as much as any transfer fee.
Behind the scenes, this window has also marked the final act of a long-serving figure. Managing director Andy Rogers, at Spurs for 24 years, has overseen the summer’s business with an eye on legacy as much as the league table. His brief has been simple: leave the women’s side in a position of strength and ensure a clean handover before he steps down.
Chasing Europe in a crowded field
So what does all this buy them? Ambition, certainly. Guarantees, no.
Tottenham are now an established WSL club with the infrastructure to match. The next step is the hardest one: breaking into Europe. Only the top three in the WSL reach the Women’s Champions League, and those spots have become the private preserve of Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester City and Manchester United.
Ho has been consistent in public and private. The goal is to compete with that group, not just inconvenience them, and to build a squad that can live at European level, not merely visit it for a season.
The competition is not limited to the traditional giants. London City Lionesses and Brighton have been spending aggressively, both with their own eyes on the top three. Their rise has acted as a warning flare for Spurs: stand still and you slide backwards.
It has helped trigger this assertive Tottenham response in a market where transfer records are being broken with increasing regularity and the women’s game is still working out its financial guardrails. Discussions around regulations and salary caps remain at an early stage. For now, clubs willing to invest face few hard limits. That freedom may not last.
A club-wide reset
The women’s spending this summer has not happened in isolation. It sits inside a broader strategic overhaul after the departure of long-serving chairman Daniel Levy in September 2025 and a reshuffle in the boardroom.
Vinai Venkatesham’s arrival from Arsenal as chief executive in April 2025 is central to that story. At Arsenal, he played a major role in turning their women’s side into a powerhouse. Tottenham hired him with that track record firmly in mind.
The men’s team, coming off a grim Premier League season that flirted with relegation, have also embarked on an ambitious window. The message is that both sides of the club will be pushed, not just patched up.
For the women, the formula is clear: pair some of the best young talent in Europe with proven WSL output. Gaupset and Sombath represent the future; Hanson and Martinez bring goals that are already battle-tested in this league. Ho is being handed a blend he can shape, not a jigsaw of short-term fixes.
The missing piece: a crowd to match the vision
One problem refuses to move as quickly as the recruitment board: the fanbase.
Tottenham’s average WSL attendance last season was just 1,734, a figure that includes the spikes from occasional games at the main stadium. For a club of this size, and for a team now being built to challenge Europe, that number jars.
The football side of the project is accelerating. The infrastructure is there. The ambition is loud. The question now is whether north London will show up in the numbers to match it – and whether this revamped Spurs squad can force their way into a Champions League conversation that has felt closed for far too long.
