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It ended up being a Spursless international break due to a COVID outbreak in the Women's team, but we have a doubleheader on Sunday to welcome both teams back to league play.

While it was disappointing not to get our Spurs fix with the Women's team while the Men were on international break, after COVID cases postponed the fixtures against Chelsea and Arsenal (the former of which had already been postponed once before for cases in Chelsea's camp), it still ended up being a fun week and a half of football. That is if you enjoy international matches as much as I do. I know some fans of club football don't watch the international games at all. Couldn't be me!

You can't beat the drama of Gareth Bale scoring a brace for Wales to help his country advance in their World Cup qualification journey, silencing the critics back in Madrid (well, probably not--hence his passionate message to the media about being more mindful of players' mental health before posting abuse just for clicks). As a fan of the German national team, I wasn't surprised to see North Macedonia pull off an upset win to knock Italy out of the World Cup--they can be a tricky team! And then there was the real-life manifestation of this Ted Lasso scene at the Ireland vs Belgium game:

It was also cool to hear about some of Tottenham's youth players getting a moment to shine for their countries. Kallum Cesay had a dream debut with Sierra Leone, scoring a brace. Dane Scarlett also scored a brace for England's U19s in their quest to qualify for the U19 Euros (with some help from Alfie Devine, who drew a penalty for Scarlett to convert). And if we still count Troy Parrott as a youth, we can give him credit for scoring a banger of a goal for Ireland. Bryan Gil also scored a goal for Spain's U21s.

There were also some disappointments, as Dejan Kulusevski's Sweden and Davinson Sánchez's Colombia were both eliminated from World Cup contention. I experienced personal disappointment when Steven Bergwijn scored against my beloved Germany, ending Hansi Flick's win streak since taking over as manager. But in all seriousness, kudos to Bergy. He's been on a great run of form for the Netherlands and certainly making an argument for himself to get more minutes with Tottenham.

And as usual, Harry Kane scored his obligatory penalty for England. I'm glad he didn't get too much playing time in England's second match; we literally can't afford for him to get injured before these last nine matches of the PL season. Also as usual, Pierre Emile Højbjerg hardly got any rest at all, playing all but about twenty minutes of Denmark's two friendlies. But he notched an assist in Denmark's second game of the week, so all is well. It was wonderful to see Christian Eriksen scoring with his first touch in the first Denmark friendly, as well as in their second match, marking a triumphant return to the stadium where he experienced his cardiac arrest during the Euros. I will admit that I was skeptical when he first announced that he was returning to playing football, but he is definitely still in top form. Long may it continue (and maybe back at Spurs? We can hope.).

On a related note, I enjoyed watching a few players that I normally don't get to see much of in league play who are potential transfer targets for Tottenham. Do I actually think we'll sign the likes of Joakim Mæhle or Nico Schotterbeck? Of course not--we'll sign more players from Serie A. But I can dream. And the biggest dream of all, besides Eriksen, is another return from Bale. Real Madrid fans might not appreciate him, but Spurs fans always will.

My lukewarm feelings towards the USMNT are well documented, but I was still happy for them to qualify for the World Cup--even if the final qualifying match against Costa Rica was a pretty anticlimactic ending to the campaign. You're telling me they couldn't score one goal against Costa Rica's B team? I would caution diehard USMNT fans from getting too overconfident about the team's chances at the WC. Though in fairness, they were missing quite a few key players to injury in this three-match cycle.

Spurs Women have to play catch-up

While we got a brief reprieve from the nightmare road trip of Chelsea followed by Arsenal, we do have to play those matches at some point... I worry that our already stretched squad is going to struggle with having such a condensed schedule to round out the season, especially if any of the players who tested positive for COVID ended up having bad symptoms. Fingers crossed that isn't the case! On a positive note, Jessica Naz was finally back in training, so hopefully she'll be back on the matchday pitch soon. Preferably Sunday!

We face Aston Villa at home on Sunday. While Villa have improved since the beginning of the season, they still have vulnerabilities. In the reverse fixture, we beat them 1-2 with a first-half penalty from Simon and a second-half goal from Williams. Spurs cannot afford to have one of their frequent poor finishing days, because Villa's keeper Hannah Hampton is quite talented, earning her England debut earlier this year. This is the part where I note that once again, Ashleigh Neville was not called up to the England squad for the next camp. The injustice!

I really don't know what to expect from this match, because it feels like we haven't seen Spurs Women play in weeks... oh right, we haven't! Who knows what the fitness statuses are for the players at this point, or what they've been working on in training (for those who have been able to train and not been in quarantine). But if we have any hope of maintaining our slim chance of a top 3 spot, this is a must-win.

New-look Newcastle... kind of

Spurs Men have their second matchup against Newcastle since the new ownership group took over the Magpies, and the first since they had the benefit of a transfer window. But it remains to be seen how many of those new transfers will actually take to the pitch on Sunday at Tottenham Hotspur stadium. Former Spur Kieran Trippier is definitely out, and Bruno Guimarães and Chris Wood have long trips back from playing with their respective international teams and won't have long to train before Sunday's match. They could also be missing keeper Martin Dúbravka, who missed international duty due to illness. On Tottenham's side, we will be hoping to see Skipp make an appearance after a lengthy injury spell. Everyone who went on international duty appears to have returned unscathed, with the possible exception of Davies, who left the Wales camp early out of precaution after a knock.

So while it won't be quite as easy to turn Newcastle over as we did at their home ground, it should still be a fairly routine win, considering the form we were in before the break.

That's all I've got for y'all today. Just a short and sweet newsletter to get hyped for the return of league play and bid a fond farewell to international action until June. We'll be back to regularly scheduled programming after this weekend's matchday!

COYS