De Zerbi Reinvents Tottenham's Midfield with Tonali and Fernandes

Roberto De Zerbi never came to Tottenham to tinker. He came to tear up, rebuild and imprint. The summer window has simply confirmed it.

The overhaul started at the back. Spurs moved quickly, snapping up Marcos Senesi, Andy Robertson and Martin Dubravka on free transfers from AFC Bournemouth, Liverpool and Burnley, then paying Brighton & Hove Albion for Jan Paul van Hecke. Four defensive signings, four statements. The message was clear: the foundations had to change.

Now the surgery has reached the heart of the team.

Tottenham have landed their fifth and sixth signings of the summer, and they are not quiet, squad-padding additions. Mateus Fernandes has arrived from West Ham United. Sandro Tonali has come in from Newcastle United. Two central midfielders, both high profile, both recruited to redefine how Spurs play under De Zerbi.

This is not a tweak to a double pivot. It is a reset.

De Zerbi’s midfield, rebuilt in one stroke

De Zerbi has leaned on a 4-2-3-1 throughout his career, and Spurs will be no different. That shape lives or dies on the quality and character of the two central midfielders. He paused his full tactical revolution during his first seven Premier League matches in charge, firefighting to keep Spurs away from relegation. Survival first, ideology later.

Now the ideology arrives.

His track record at Brighton and Marseille points to a distinctive blend: long spells of possession, high pressing and sudden, violent shifts of tempo into direct, vertical attacks. The hallmark is what has become known as “press-baiting” – inviting pressure by playing out from the back in rehearsed patterns, drawing opponents in, then slicing through them and exploding forward as if on the counter-attack.

To pull that off, the midfield cannot be passive. It has to be the engine and the trigger.

De Zerbi wants players who can take the ball under pressure, use one-touch combinations to escape, then drive passes through the lines when the moment comes to accelerate. They must run, tackle, press and still have the composure to dictate. At Brighton, Alexis Mac Allister and Moises Caicedo gave him that perfect balance. Both have since gone on to become central figures at Liverpool and Chelsea.

In north London, Fernandes and Tonali inherit that responsibility.

Why these two?

Look at Spurs’ most-used central midfielders in 2025/26 and the logic behind this double signing jumps out.

De Zerbi’s football demands aggression without the ball. High turnovers – winning possession in open play within 40 metres of the opposition goal – are not a bonus, they are a requirement. So are ball recoveries, the dirty work of claiming loose balls to keep attacks alive or start them afresh. Conor Gallagher, used as an attacking midfielder late last season, thrived in that chaos and became vital because of his pressing.

Tonali and Fernandes fit that profile. Data from the 2025/26 Premier League season places them among the league’s more active midfielders in those high-impact defensive actions. They press, they hunt, they regain.

On the ball, the gap between them and Spurs’ existing options is just as stark. The pair stand out for final-third entries – moving the ball from outside the final third into it – and for the sheer volume and accuracy of their passing. They move it forward, and they rarely waste it.

The numbers tell the story clearly.

Per 90 minutes, Tonali completes 13.24 passes into the final third and 16.81 forward passes, with an open-play pass accuracy of 84.8%. Fernandes delivers 10.30 final-third passes and 12.65 forward passes at 87.8% accuracy. Both also win possession in the final third around once every two games (Tonali 0.53, Fernandes 0.51).

Compare that with Spurs’ 2025/26 midfield core. Pape Matar Sarr completes 9.96 final-third passes and 10.55 forward passes (84.4% accuracy, 0.32 possessions won in the final third). Archie Gray sits at 6.57 and 10.77 (82.7%, 0.12). Joao Palhinha records 5.53 and 12.86 (81.8%, 0.20). Rodrigo Bentancur offers 7.56 and 11.70 (85.6%, 0.33).

Tonali and Fernandes do more, higher up the pitch, and still keep the ball better.

Crucially for De Zerbi, their output lines up with the gold standard he enjoyed at Brighton. In 2022/23, Mac Allister produced 14.16 final-third passes, 14.16 forward passes, 87.0% accuracy and 0.90 possessions won in the final third. Caicedo posted 14.22, 15.62, 88.7% and 0.57 respectively.

Fernandes and Tonali do not just lift Spurs’ level; they echo the profile of the pair who powered De Zerbi’s best work in England.

Roles and responsibilities: the new double pivot

Within that framework, the roles are clearly defined.

Fernandes is the creative half of the duo. He can hit long, raking diagonals, slide clever through-balls or drive past opponents with line-breaking dribbles. In many ways, he resembles a No 10 dropped deeper, far more inventive than the more functional midfielders already on the books.

His chance-creation and dribbling numbers underline it. Last season he created 32 chances and attempted 31 take-ons. Only Tonali, among the two new arrivals, matched and surpassed that blend of creativity and ambition, with 37 chances created and 48 take-ons attempted.

Set those figures against Spurs’ current midfielders in 2025/26 and the contrast is sharp. Sarr created 11 chances and attempted 22 take-ons. Gray produced 8 and 16. Palhinha, 8 and 23. Bentancur, 10 and 32. Fernandes and Tonali sit on a different tier of attacking involvement.

All of this came with Fernandes playing in a cautious West Ham side that slid into relegation. Place that same player in a front-foot, possession-heavy, risk-taking De Zerbi team and his influence should only grow.

Tonali, by contrast, is the destroyer with a playmaker’s brain. He mirrors the Caicedo role: a ball-winner who does not just break up play and pass square, but steps forward, snaps into tackles, then looks immediately to punch the ball into dangerous areas. Think Palhinha or Bentancur in terms of defensive bite, but with a more proactive instinct once he has the ball.

He will be the one sliding across to cover full-backs, shutting down counters, then starting Spurs’ own attacks with those quick, vertical passes. He anchors the chaos De Zerbi wants to create, while also fuelling it.

A midfield with De Zerbi’s personality

Strip away the graphs and tables and one thing stands out: the personality of these signings.

Fernandes and Tonali both play with urgency. They do not wait for the game to come to them; they grab it. They are forward-thinking, aggressive and comfortable in high-risk zones of the pitch. That is precisely where De Zerbi wants his team to live.

For Tottenham, this is more than a couple of smart additions. It is a deliberate step away from the more controlled, pragmatic Thomas Frank era and back towards the front-foot, adventurous principles that Ange Postecoglou tried to embed, now fused with De Zerbi’s own brand of calculated chaos.

The defence has been rebuilt. The midfield has been reimagined in a single, bold move. If De Zerbi’s plan holds, Spurs will not just look different next season. They will feel different – especially in the engine room where Tonali and Fernandes now set the tempo.