Tottenham Hotspur head coach Ange Postecoglou has allayed fears over the availability of Cristian Romero and Son Heung-min for Monday's Premier League London derby against Fulham.
Both players sustained minor niggles during the international break, where Romero was only able to complete 45 minutes of Argentina's World Cup qualifying win over Peru on Tuesday.
The defender had taken a whack to the ankle during the first half of that contest, although reports have stated that he was optimistic of shaking off the issue in time for the return of domestic action.
Meanwhile, September's Premier League Player of the Month Son has been taken off before the end in each of his side's last five Premier League games, and he was an unused substitute during South Korea's recently friendly with Tunisia.
The 31-year-old returned to the starting lineup against Vietnam on Tuesday, recording a goal and assist in a 6-0 thrashing, although he appeared to be in pain during the match as he saw out the full 90.
© Reuters
However, speaking to Tottenham's media channels on Friday afternoon, Postecoglou suggested that both Son and Romero would be fit for Monday alongside the rest of their international players.
"We've got not issues around availability for Monday at this stage," Postecoglou said. "Obviously we've got a couple more days and it helps that we've got a Monday night game, but no issues around the guys coming back."
While Son and Romero will seemingly be fit to take their places in the starting lineup in North London, both Ivan Perisic and Manor Solomon remain absent after undergoing knee operations, while goalkeeper Alfie Whiteman is also absent with an ankle issue.
Postecoglou refused to rule Brennan Johnson out of the fixture, though, as the Welshman enters the final stages of his recovery from the hamstring issue he sustained in September's North London derby draw with Arsenal.
The Australian also revealed that Rodrigo Bentancur is back in full training after eight months out with a knee problem, but Ryan Sessegnon is still some way off from coming back from a thigh operation.
© Reuters
"He [Johnson] has had a good couple of weeks of training. The flip side of the guys going away is that we could do some work with some of the guys who are here, Brennan, Bentancur, Bryan Gil, guys who haven't played a lot of football so far.
"We got some good work into them and they've progressed well through the international break, we'll see how they're going for Monday night in Brennan's case but we had a good solid block of training.
"Sess is still a fair way away, he's very much longer-term, but Rodrigo's been training, he's now fully integrated into the group which is great, he's obviously missed a lot of football so we'll be measured in how we reintroduce him.
"The more he trains with the lads, the more you see him feeling more like himself, and it will be good to get him back amongst them."
Postecoglou will also be without suspended midfielder Yves Bissouma for the capital clash, as the Mali international was dismissed for two bookable offences in their 1-0 win over Luton Town two weekends ago.
Spurs enter gameweek nine sitting clear of Arsenal at the top of the table on goals scored, but the Lilywhites could have potentially been bumped down to fourth place by the time Monday's game rolls around.
No Data Analysis info
