The last time Mohammed Kudus was seen at Tottenham he was disappearing down the tunnel in disgrace after a red card leading to a five-match ban and a stern ticking off from his boss.
It had been an eventful derby game for Kudus. He opened with terrific zeal, causing problems for Pedro Porro and firing West Ham ahead before Spurs replied with four goals inside half an hour and he lost his head.
First with a nasty foul from behind on Micky van de Ven, then with an angry reaction in the ensuing skirmish, shoving both the Dutch defender and Pape Matar Sarr in their faces.
Julen Lopetegui frowned disapprovingly. ‘Not good for him or the team,’ tutted West Ham’s head coach with pressure quickly gathering around his spluttering start to the season.
He promised they would talk, but the Hammers accrued more points in the five games with Kudus banned than they did in the previous five with him and when he returned there was no discernible uptick, certainly not enough to spare Lopetegui the sack.
All of which plays to the conundrum at the heart of Tottenham’s £55million swoop for the Ghana international forward.
Tottenham Hotspur completed the signing of Mohammed Kudus from West Ham for £55million
Kudus had an £85m release clause and has signed a six-year contract with Spurs until 2025
Kudus scored 13 times in 65 Premier League appearances for the Hammers, with nine assists
Kudus is wonderfully gifted. Capable of outrageous individual brilliance sure and thrill supporters, but is it a talent easily harnessed within the demands of a successful modern team?
Does he have the emotional maturity to deliver consistently one game to the next? One season to the next? Can he dominate an entire game rather than in unplayable purple patches?
Will all that come? He is after all only 24, and Mo Salah was into his mid-20s before he reached this level of influence. Or will he always be erratic as creative forwards and wingers can be? And is that enough in an age where few attacking players are on the pitch for 90 minutes.
Lopetegui could not unlock the secret in time, and Graham Potter has ultimately sanctioned his sale because West Ham need money to reinvest and rebuild and Jarrod Bowen is more reliable in the position in which they both like to play, on the right of a front three.
In a short career thus far, Kudus has produced one good season for each of his three clubs.
At Nordsjaelland, in Denmark, he emerged as a teenager in a blaze of 11 goals in 27 Superliga games and earned a £7.8million move to Ajax as they rebuilt the team decimated over two years after reaching the last four of the Champions League.
His first two seasons in Amsterdam were disrupted by injuries but brought him three major trophies before his third was lit up with 18 goals across 42 games albeit no silverware.
West Ham were convinced enough to pay £38m and, after being introduced gently at first by David Moyes, Kudus scored eight Premier League goals in his debut season, the last of them an overhead kick at Manchester City.
He scored eight Premier League goals in his debut season, the last a bicycle kick at Man City
The last time Kudus was seen at Tottenham he was disappearing down the tunnel in disgrace
He opened the scoring at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium before the hosts scored four in a row
His performance in that 3-1 defeat at City convinced Josko Gvardiol to hail him as his toughest opponent.
There were five more in the Europa League, including a spectacular solo goal on a mazy dribble down the centre of the pitch from deep inside his own half, against Freiburg in March 2024.
Within six months, however, things were unravelling. With Moyes gone, first Lopetegui and then Potter changed the styles and shapes of the team, and captain Bowen reinforced his hold on the position coveted by Kudus.
Up in the stands on the day of the red card at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium was Chris Hughton, who served Spurs as a player and a coach and had recently spent two years as a technical advisor and head coach of Ghana.
‘He wasn’t very popular that day, but I do think Tottenham supporters will like him, and the players will know he is talented enough to make them a better team,’ Hughton told Mail Sport.
‘He has very good technical ability and great strength on the ball, difficult to dispossess. He reminds me a little bit of Dejan Kulusevski, left footed with lovely manoeuvring skills.
‘What Kudus has is an explosive change of pace to get away from opponents. He is a game changer, no doubt. He can have those moments that make things happen for the team.’
Hughton’s instinct is that Kudus is best suited to playing as a number 10 rather than wide. ‘You want him in and around the box, making things happen,’ he said, recalling two Kudus goals for Ghana in a 2-2 draw against Egypt at the Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON).
West Ham were paid Ajax £38million for Kudus, who was introduced gently by David Moyes
Kudus scored Ghana’s second goal in an AFCON group stage clash against Egypt last January
Yet he has seen both Ajax and West Ham deploy him in wide areas and agrees he is more comfortable and effective playing off the right, cutting inside to threaten goal with his stronger foot.
‘With that type of player it will always be about whether they have the consistency game in, game out, away from home and at home, to have the effect you want,’ said Hughton, whose tenure as Ghana boss ended after failing to make it past the group stages of the AFCON finals in the Ivory Coast in January 2024.
Results worsened after his departure though, when Ghana failed to qualify for the next tournament, which starts in Morocco in December, finishing bottom of the qualifying group, winless in six games.
It means Spurs will not lose him midseason, but the humiliation for the four times champions of Africa left Kudus exposed in the firing line, accused by some Black Stars fans of underperforming and ridiculed when his 96th minute penalty was saved in a 2-1 defeat at home to Niger in November 2024.
Sections of the crowd chanted for him to miss as he prepared for the spot kick then cheered ironically when he did, three days after elimination had been confirmed with a draw in Angola.
Perhaps these pressures had repercussions on his form at West Ham, where he clashed with Lopetegui after being subbed at half-time against Brentford, early in his second season at the club.
Then came the red card at Spurs with the ban extended from three games to five by the FA, and Ghana’s failure to reach AFCON for the first time in more than 20 years.
Events seemed to conspire against Kudus and he seemed a little lost in East London, particularly after Joseph Anang left the Hammers for St Patrick’s in Dublin.
‘I do think Tottenham supporters will like him,’ ex-Ghana boss Chris Hughton told Mail Sport
Thomas Frank has settled on Kudus as an alternative after failing to land both Eze and Mbeumo
Anang was a back-up goalkeeper who had been at the club since 2017. He was also Ghanaian, two months older than Kudus and quickly assumed an unofficial role as a minder for his compatriot when he first arrived from Ajax.
He would chauffeur Kudus around in his VW Polo, and they spent much of their social time together before Anang’s exit in the summer of 2024.
So, there were mitigating factors for his lost his rhythm and always the odd reminder of his talent and joyous approach to football.
After scoring against Brighton at the London Stadium in December, Kudus unveiled an elaborately carved wooden elephant stool and sat on it as part of his trademark celebration.
It had been specially shipped in by West Ham staff after 18 months seeing him go in searching for stools vacated by the stewards or ballboys when his goals flew in.
This magnificent artefact was the type used by the tribal chiefs of Ghana and symbolised authority, Kudus explained afterwards, but he has not been able to use it again.
He scored twice more for the Hammers but both times away from the London Stadium, and he ended the season with only five goals.
Ajax built the team decimated after reaching the semis of the Champions League around Kudus
There is no doubt Spurs have done thorough due diligence and are backing Frank to refine him
Tottenham have not been deterred. Having failed to lure Bryan Mbeumo from Brentford and ruled Eberechi Eze from Crystal Palace too expensive, new boss Thomas Frank and technical director Johan Lange have settled on Kudus as an alternative, willing to put last season down as a simple blip in his development.
The Danes now influential at Spurs will have run checks on his data and had easy access to references for a player who graduated from the Right to Dream academy founded near Accra and progressed through Nordsjaelland, the Danish club owned by the academy.
Kasper Hjulmand, who worked closely with Frank and Lange at Lyngby, was head coach of Nordsjaelland when Kudus first arrived, and gave him his debut in 2018 before leaving to take charge of Denmark.
Hjulmand was succeeded by Flemming Pedersen who later worked briefly at Brentford with the B-team.
As at West Ham, the Danes remember Kudus as quiet and polite with a supreme confidence in his own ability.
There is no doubt Spurs will have done thorough due diligence and are backing Frank to refine him as he proved he can with Mbeumo, an explosive player with similar qualities playing similar roles across the front line.
