[NoSkillz]

Sat. August 16, 2025

Barclays Premier League
Tottenham vs. Dover
White Hart Lane, London, England

Betting Odds: Tottenham: 5-4 (Favourites) Draw: 11-5 Dover: 7-4
Past Meetings: 10W 4D 2L

We ended our 2024/25 season playing Spurs, defeating them 1-0 to win our first ever FA Cup and now face them in the Premier League season opener. Tottenham finished 6th in the league last year and will play in the Europa League this year. They spent £52 million in the transfer market this summer, with star winger Daniele Bentivoglio being the big signing at £26 million, coming over from Everton. They also splashed another £17 million on Mallorca’s Evgeny Kuzmin, a 27 year old Russian defender. We get a bit of a break, as top striker Peter Jansen is injured for today’s game but they still have Jean Junior, a fine talent himself.

We go with a very familiar lineup today but I’ll be closely watching players like Chiquinho, Gianluca Bolis and captain Salim Loucif. I want to see good games from all three today and we’ll need a great game from Paul Moses as well, as he looks to bounce back this year after an injury riddled campaign last year. We’re slight underdogs today but I’ll stick with our control mentality on the road.

Dover: 4-4-2 Control
GK - I. Wilke
D - Renato Gaucho, C. Contreras, R. Hamon, S. Loucif
M - M. Pedersen, B. Raab, Jose, G. Bolis
S - P. Moses, Chiquinho
Bench - Rafinha, M. Mutesa, R. Lopez, E. Harvey, N. Cairney, S. De la Vega, A. Broomes

Flat 4-4-2 for Tottenham, with Jean Junior being joined by Antonio Martin up front. Matthieu Dreyer is in goal. I get a note from my assistant that midfielder Jose is “jet lagged” and looks “exhausted” in the warmups but he’s in the lineup and will just need to suck it up! I tell the players this is a winnable game and pull aside Chiquinho, Bolis and Loucif to tell them I expect a performance today.

20’ - The play has been pretty even thus far, with our best chance coming early on a Contreras header off a corner kick. Later, we have a free kick from distance and from a full 30 yards out, Benedict Raab sends a curling rocket into the right top corner of the goal past an outstretched Dreyer for the sensational goal! WHAT A SHOT!! DOVER GOAL 1-0

34’ - We earn a corner and Raab’s cross is mishandled by Dreyer and the ball pops right to the foot of Mads Pedersen, who slams it into the net. Pedersen was just foiled on a full field breakaway minutes earlier but makes up for it here! DOVER GOAL 2-0

HALFTIME - A very strange half, as I feel we were outplayed severely despite the two goal lead. The possession stats are UGLY - Spurs held 57% of the ball but we outshoot them 12-7 (7-1 on target). Our passing was noticeably terrible (69%), with countless unforced giveaways. We need to be better but we’ll take the two goal lead.

58’ - I pull off Salim Loucif, who got dinged up early in the game. In comes Rodolfo Lopez in his first official appearance for our club.

64’ - The jet lagged Jose comes off and in comes Neil Cairney.

66’ - I pull back into a counter attacking mentality.

76’ - Spurs have been knocking on our door the whole second half and Jean Junior dances around two players, cuts in and shoots. It hits another Spurs player, hits the crossbar then hits poor Ingo Wilke in the back and bounces in. It’s called an own goal and Tottenham are right back in this. TOTTENHAM GOAL 2-1

Spurs move immediately to a 4-2-4 formation.

87’ - Sergio De la Vega is on for Gianluca Bolis.

We hold them off the rest of the way.

Tottenham 1 - 2 Dover
Goals - Benedict Raab (8.1), Mads Pedersen (7.5)
Assists - Benedict Raab, Chiquinho (7.5)
Man of the Match - Benedikt Raab
Other Dover Notables - Salim Loucif (7.1), Rayane Hamon (7.5), Claudio Contreras (7.2), Renato Gaucho (7.0)
Attendance - 36,310

Spurs really took it to us in that half but we hold on. In the end, they held 52% of the ball but we outshoot them 22-13 (7-6 on target). Paul Moses was noticeable but lacked the cutting edge we’ve seen in the past and only had a 6.2 rating today. Our passing overall was terrible - we need to be much better.

-- In other match ups, Liverpool upset Chelsea but City, United and Arsenal all win.



Dover U18 Update

-- I expect a huge season from our very talented group of youngsters this year and they don’t disappoint in game one, winning 6-0 over Wycombe. Our striker group is ridiculous this year and right off the hop, we get four goals from Fernando Estrada and two from Marcus Sowter. Our third striker, Bakary Kone, sat this one out after just returning from international duty.



Season Ticket Sales

-- We end up selling 8153 season ticket packages, up from last year’s total of 7467.



Transfer OUT

-- We bid adieu to defender Saber Nasri, as he accepts a deal with Sevilla, thus completing a £6.25 million transfer. The 27 year old Tunisia international joined us in July 2023 and played two full seasons for our club, playing 66 games, quite a high number considering he was our third DC. He scored 8 goals and added 6 assists. He always played very well when called upon but there were a few things working against him - his advancing age, the fact his contract was up after this year and the fact he was asking for way too much money considering his declining role with our club. We have the emerging star in Mwemere Mutesa and newcomer Adrian Torres and they will both step in as our main backups. We wish Nasri the best of luck with his new club and thank him for his service.



Dover Injury Update

-- Arsene Bamba is our only injured player but he will miss up to two months with a torn hamstring.



Dover Reserves Team Update

-- Paolo Secchi scored twice and added an assist as we win 5-0 over Wolves. Also scoring were Andy Broomes, Gianluca Bolis and U18 newcomer Bakary Kone. Manuel Lugo added two assists.



Dover Injury Update

-- Oh boy. Mads Pedersen sustains a twisted knee during training and will miss up to two weeks. Now our top two left midfielders are out. We are down to Rafinha, who is a left fullback and 17 year old Jonathan Langlet from our U18 team. Felix Hernandez is on a season-long loan and can’t be recalled. Ugh. We should be okay for now.



Jose Unhappy

-- So, star midfielder Jose is unhappy with his contract and decides to express his displeasure with his teammates. I call him into my office and blast him for being unprofessional and he apologizes. He already showed up to camp out of shape, was “jet lagged” in our season opener and generally hasn’t played great all preseason. So I’m going to bench him in our home opener against Aston Villa - that will show him who is the boss!



Next Up

-- We welcome Aston Villa to Crabble Athletic Ground in our Premier League home opener.