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“It’s very rare that this many clubs call you for a player,” Bayern Munich’s sporting director, Max Eberl, told Kicker last week when talking about the options available to Mathys Tel. It spoke not just of widespread recognition among Europe’s elite clubs of the 19‑year‑old’s quality but of a shift of policy in the Bundesliga leaders’ camp; from shutting their ears to all approaches at the beginning of January to accepting that leveraging a financial advantage out of the situation was the best they could do. A month-long transfer window leaves room for plenty of changes of heart and mind.
Some will snort that Tottenham were a mere backup choice after Tel declined their initial approach, that the forward blinked when faced with the prospect of a second half of the Bundesliga season like his first, given a mere 253 minutes of playing time. More probable is that an especially reflective young man took time to think of what would work best for him rather than what would most suit Bayern. There is little contradictory about the process when you consider Tel is an explosive attacking weapon with the maturity to constantly adapt.
Fiercely ambitious yet humble. Enormously confident in his ability yet grounded. Surrounded by close family after Bayern games, but not stuck in his bubble; when L’Équipe sent a journalist to Munich to interview Tel at the club’s Säbener Strasse training centre last year, the young forward arrived to greet him with a smile on his face and a box full of pastries fresh from a local French patisserie.
And frustrated, without doubt, by being the perpetual understudy to Harry Kane but never less than grateful for everything he has been able to learn in the past 17 months from the England captain, who has a high regard for Tel. Backing up Kane, the hyper-reliable superstar who never rests, must be the most infuriating role in world football for a youngster with talent to burn and a barely containable desire to improve. It has also led to Tel being slightly miscast.
You may have already read descriptions of Tottenham’s new man as a winger. His natural gifts – and Kane’s natural indefatigability – may have frequently pushed Tel out wide, but sometimes his natural abilities suggest he is something that perhaps he is not. The pace, the ability to take on defenders and the intelligence to find the right pass for a teammate make him perfect winger material. It’s just, most of the time, that he’s only in these positions to fit around Kane.
Maybe, in time, the way in which Tel has broadened his palette could be considered a belated parting gift from the England captain to his old club. The France Under-21 player’s first instinct has always been to shoot, with the power he has in either foot. Within weeks of Tel’s arrival in Bavaria, Thomas Müller heralded him as “an unbelievable finisher”. That ability to take chances is borne out by his tally of 10 goals last season, despite being given only nine starts across the Bundesliga, DFB‑Pokal and Champions League, with Thomas Tuchel building on Julian Nagelsmann’s experiments in sending Tel on in the closing stages to voraciously attack weary defences.
Yet the really interesting statistic is the six assists that accompany the goals. Rather than having a desperation to catch the coach’s attention with a spectacular individual contribution, Tel regularly underlined his wit and humility to do what the team needed. Take the Champions League win against Galatasaray in November 2023. One-on-one with his future Bayern teammate Sacha Boey, he might have been tempted to cut in and get a shot off to make his mark. Instead, he set up Kane with a precise first‑time pass for an easy tap-in to ice a devilishly difficult game.
That ability and versatility should come as no surprise, given that Tel is from impeccable footballing stock. He was born in the suburbs of Paris but is a graduate of the elite academy production line at Rennes, which has produced players including Yoann Gourcuff, Sylvain Wiltord, Yann M’Vila, Ousmane Dembélé and Eduardo Camavinga. It was Camavinga’s record that Tel broke in August 2021 when he became the youngest player to turn out for Rennes, at 16 years, three months and 19 days. A year later (after a €28.5m transfer) he became Bayern’s youngest scorer, in a Pokal win against Viktoria Köln, eclipsing Jamal Musiala.
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Opportunities have become fewer under Vincent Kompany. Whereas Tuchel planned to leave Kane out of games in the Pokal, Germany’s national cup competition, the new coach started Kane at Mainz in late October. Tel entered in Kane’s stead at half-time with Bayern 4-0 up – garbage time, as it would be framed in basketball. The logjam in wide areas – with Leroy Sané, a revitalised Kingsley Coman, the arrival of Michael Olise and sometimes Musiala competing for roles – has left little room for Tel elsewhere in the team.
So off to Tottenham he goes and, whether by accident or design, it feels like the perfect destination. With his preference to play at centre-forward or in the corridor between the centre and the left (a little like his more senior compatriot Kylian Mbappé), the picture appears all set up for Tel to provide Spurs with a succession plan for Son Heung-min. He can contribute in the short term and have the team built around him next. By choosing to leave Bayern, Tel has underlined that he considers now to be his time.
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