Tottenham’s Cathinka Tandberg has bold dreams for women’s team regardless of men’s plight

The closest Spurs have edged towards it was in 2024, finishing a club-record sixth and reaching a first FA Cup final (losing 4-0 to United). The very next season, Spurs dissolved into an 11-game winless run, finished second from bottom and sacked head coach Robert Vilahamn one year into a new three-year deal.

“Obviously people will think [this season] is lucky because that’s what people think about when they think about Tottenham’s women’s team because it’s been like that,” she says, her voice carrying a begrudging edge. In the hours after her lob against Everton, many questioned its authenticity, ignoring that she executed the precise goal 24 hours earlier in training. The same doubts have followed Spurs, even when they were as high as third in the table under new manager Martin Ho earlier this year.

Spurs have since tapered to fifth, a three-match losing streak in the league (including successive 5-2 defeats to City and Arsenal), sending them seven points adrift of United in fourth and, for some in the game, to a part of the table that makes more sense.

“I’m actually going to say I’m really disappointed because there are loads of games where we should have taken three points against teams that are below us,” Tandberg says.

“That’s s*** when you sit there and think we could actually have already beaten our record points total, given all that we have here; the infrastructure, the belief of what this club can achieve. Of course, we can sit there and say we’ve done well because we did better than last year but there’s some games we’re like f***, why didn’t we take three points? Because we should.”

Tandberg has always been a vault of self-belief (“I play with a lot of personality and to do that I need to have confidence,” she says), but this season she has come to embody the new vintage of Spurs Women: young, hungry and brash enough to declare its intentions, even if it means reckoning with failing to reach them publicly.

Spurs’ recent losing streak represents the first time under Ho, who joined Spurs in July from Norwegian side Brann, that they have lost successive league matches. They have conceded 36 goals, the third-worst in the league, with a third arriving in just their last three matches.

No one expected Spurs to solve all of last season’s foibles. They have made inroads on the pitch, appointed smartly off it and shattered their club-record transfer fee three times, for defender Toko Koga, Tandberg and Norway midfielder Signe Gaupset in January.

But Ho has emphasised that while Europe is an ambition, achieving it would always take more than one season. Considering Spurs’ record against the WSL’s top four sides this season (two draws and five defeats with an aggregate score of 8-21), it’s difficult to disagree.

Building on this year is paramount, an ambition despite having to contend with the men’s first team’s potential relegation from the Premier League and the financial implications that accompany a behemoth trying to fit into the shoes of a Championship club.

Spurs Women, like almost all women’s teams in the UK, remain heavily reliant on the revenue of their men’s team. While their budget, like most, pales in comparison to the men’s senior team — in their most recent financial accounts published in March, Spurs women’s total salaries, including bonuses, amounted to £3.73 million last season — and any expenditure on the women’s section is classed as an add back in Profit and Sustainability Rules (PSR) calculations, the team still affect the club’s overall bottom line. There are plenty of cautionary tales, most recently Blackburn Rovers, Reading and even Everton, of suffering a financial clampdown amid the men’s team’s struggles.

Those internally insist that the women’s team’s future is secure. The summer’s budget has been confirmed, they say, and the club are actively working on securing multiple signings, while more investment is planned for the academy infrastructure. Ho signed a new long-term deal last month, as have key midfielders Olivia Holdt and Matilda Vinberg. “We’ll be in a good place [even if the men’s team suffers relegation],” Ho says. “The leadership want to support the team, make sure we’re progressing so that won’t affect us.”

For Tandberg, the image of Spurs sitting in the Premier League relegation zone is complicated by her own perception of the team she has supported since childhood, travelling over the North Sea to accompany her dad to matches at White Hart Lane. She’s watched Harry Kane score in the Champions League and Gareth Bale order Maicon a taxi.

“I didn’t know what Spursy meant until I moved here,” she says. She’s since learned. “I’ve always watched Spurs, but for me, Tottenham, it’s a Champions League club. They’ve just been unlucky this season. Of course, I have to separate it because I can’t be sad every day because they’re being threatened with relegation, which of course is s***, but I don’t think it’ll happen. I really don’t. I just try to stay positive.”

Ho had thrice before tried to cajole Tandberg to Brann during his two seasons there, only for Tandberg to feel she was better served by other clubs. It is a sign of the distance travelled under Ho that Spurs cut itself as the destination for Tandberg.

“When he contacted me to come here, he was, like, I’m not going to speak to you again if you say no to this one,” she laughs.

“I trust him a lot,” she adds. “I can talk to him about anything that’s happening, on the pitch or off it, and he can talk to me about what he expects.

“I’m also a really passionate player, and he’s a passionate guy. He can feel what I feel. I’ve been really open about my ADHD and he’s been so easy to talk with about that. Sometimes on the pitch I can make an aggressive tackle or get yellow-carded and I’m like, ‘f***’ . That was my ADHD coming out too much. But Martin’s really good at being like ‘Tinks, come on,’ and turning my head back on.”

Conveniently, on Tandberg’s right thigh, the words One Day At A Time shout back in black ink. For a kind of media-trained anarchist, the sight of football’s most reliable interview cop-out (“one game at a time”) burnished into her thigh muscle triggers a smile.

“I’ve been thinking about taking it away,” Tandberg says of the tattoo she got two years ago. “You know when you get older and you know all those things?”

But even the most ambitious occasionally require a reminder of something so basic. The past month has been that for Spurs and Tandberg, who has failed to score since her brace in the 7-3 thrashing of Aston Villa in February. Her strong start to the season stuttered after suffering an undisclosed injury in November.

Tandberg was forced to miss the reverse fixture against United, watching helplessly from home as United – the former employers of Ho, assistant manager Lawrence Shamieh and new goalkeeping coach Ian Wilcock – salvaged a breathless point after going 3-0 down before the hour mark.

“Half of our staff has worked at United so this one means a little bit more for everyone,” Tandberg says of Sunday’s match. “We know what it means when you play against your old team. You want to prove them wrong, to show that we’re the better team.”

Victory would also close the gap to United to five, shifting Spurs closer to the top four and their best finish as the season comes to a close. Doing so won’t be easy, but Tandberg refuses to unsubscribe from bold dreams.

“We’re such a great group, so we need to have something to reach for,” she says. “And if you don’t reach it, it’s not like the world is going under.”

This article originally appeared in The Athletic.

Tottenham Hotspur, Soccer, Women's Soccer

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