Tottenham Eyes Icardi Amid Goal Crisis Under De Zerbi

Tottenham’s start to the Premier League season has been blunt, joyless and, above all, goalless. Four league games, zero goals. For a club that once prided itself on attacking flair, the numbers are stark and the mood around the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium is turning quickly.

Under Roberto De Zerbi, Spurs were supposed to be bold and incisive. Instead, they sit 17th in the table with just two points from two draws and two defeats, their early promise drowned out by eight goals conceded and not a single one scored in reply. The Carabao Cup brought a brief surge of optimism with a 5-1 win over Charlton Athletic, but Liverpool promptly exposed the gulf between Spurs and the league’s elite with a midweek cup exit.

So the search for answers has already begun. And it has led them to a familiar name.

Icardi on the radar

According to Cronache di Spogliatoio, Tottenham are weighing up a move for Mauro Icardi as a short‑term fix to their attacking malaise. At 33, the Argentine is not a long-term project. He is a stopgap, a specialist, a penalty-box predator being asked to solve a very specific problem: put the ball in the net.

Icardi is currently a free agent after ending a four-year stint with Galatasaray, where he plundered goals in the Super Lig and helped the Istanbul club to four league titles. His CV also carries two Ligue 1 crowns from his time at Paris Saint‑Germain. Spurs, right now, would happily settle for one scruffy finish off his knee.

The move is not straightforward. Journalist Nahuel Ferreira reports that Olympiacos have already made formal contact with Icardi’s camp as they look to close a deal. No agreement has been reached, with the striker’s wage demands a major obstacle. He is understood to be earning around £8.6 million per year, a figure that would force any suitor to think hard before committing.

Tottenham are thinking. They may have to act.

Big spending, small returns

The interest in Icardi comes on the back of a lavish summer. Spurs did not enter this season undercooked. They spent heavily, aggressively, and with a clear intention to reshape the squad around De Zerbi’s ideas.

• Sandro Tonali arrived for £100 million, a marquee signing expected to anchor midfield and set the tempo.
• Mateus Fernandes cost £85 million.
• Winger Savio, another £85 million.
• On top of that, Omar Marmoush came in from Manchester City on loan with a £60 million obligation to buy written into the deal.

The outlay was huge. The output has been negligible.

Marmoush, trusted to lead the line in the league against Newcastle, Nottingham Forest and in the 3-1 defeat to Liverpool, is still searching for his first Tottenham goal. There have been flashes of sharp movement, the odd half-chance fashioned out of nothing, but nothing that has forced a change to the scoreboard.

Dominic Solanke’s start has been equally underwhelming. Picked regularly, he has yet to justify his selection with a single goal in his first five appearances. For a side already short on confidence, each blank feels heavier than the last.

Then there is Richarlison. Once a central figure in Spurs’ attack, he now finds himself completely frozen out after a disastrous fallout with the club. He has not played since the 3-0 opening-day defeat to Brentford and is no longer part of the first-team picture. A high‑profile asset, effectively written off at a time when goals are at a premium.

This is the backdrop against which Icardi’s name has re-entered the Premier League conversation.

De Zerbi under growing pressure

De Zerbi was hired to inject structure and edge into a squad that had drifted. Instead, four league games into the campaign, his team looks disjointed and unsure of itself in the final third. Possession has not translated into penetration. New signings have not yet meshed into a coherent attacking unit.

The early league table is unforgiving. Seventeenth place, two points from a possible twelve, eight goals conceded and none scored. It is not just the results; it is the manner of them. The sense that Spurs lack a focal point, a ruthless finisher, someone to turn half-chances into hard numbers.

That is where Icardi comes in. He does not solve the pressing, the build-up patterns or the long-term squad profile. He does, however, offer something Spurs currently do not have: a proven, experienced finisher who has made a career out of thriving in crowded penalty areas and tense moments.

The financial equation is delicate. Matching or even approaching his current wage level would stretch Tottenham’s structure, especially after such a heavy summer of spending. The competition from Olympiacos, already at the table, adds another layer of urgency.

But the Premier League table adds the most pressure of all. A club that spent the summer retooling for a new era now finds itself staring at a familiar question: when the chances finally come, who is going to score?

Tottenham may soon decide that, for all the cost and all the complications, Mauro Icardi is an answer they can no longer afford to ignore.