Tottenham's pre-season tour of South Korea is brought to you in association with Nord VPN, sponsors of football.london's coverage.
Ryan Sessegnon has revealed that new Tottenham signing Ivan Perisic has already been giving him tips on how to improve as a young wing-back.
Sessegnon burst into the game as a teenage starlet for Fulham ahead of his move to Spurs in the summer of 2019. Hamstring problems fragmented the now 22-year-old's attempts to kick on at the Premier League club until last season when he finally started to make the breakthrough under Antonio Conte.
This summer Tottenham signed 33-year-old Perisic on a free transfer at the end of his contract with Inter. The Croatian will bring with him a wealth of experience, having won the Champions League, the Serie A title under Conte and the Bundesliga title with both Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund, as well as domestic cup triumphs with four different clubs.
READ MORE: Djed Spence delay, Conte's strange timing and huge financial impact of Tottenham's Korea tour
Perisic scored 10 goals and provided nine assists in 49 matches for Inter Milan last season, showing no signs of slowing down across almost 4,000 minutes of football. Conte sees Perisic as being a crucial cog in improving the squad's mentality in the big moments next season and the Croatian is a firm believer in the Italian's coaching methods. He played as a left wing-back under Conte at Inter and can also play as a conventional winger, or even alongside the striker if required.
With Sergio Reguilon expected to move on, Conte also envisaged another role for the experienced Perisic as both he and Spurs' managing director of football Fabio Paratici believe that Perisic can help mentor and push on Sessegnon to develop as the wing-back duo share the large amount of matches on offer next season with Spurs' return to the Champions League.
Sessegnon admitted while on tour in South Korea that Perisic has already begun that process in helping him develop while he recovered from his own calf injury.
"I can learn a lot from him technically, mentally and physically. He’s already helped me with little pointers, tips about the way to affect the game more in an attacking sense and score more goals," said the England U21 international. "Being in the box at the right time more often when the ball’s on the other side, being smart, using my brain, communicating a bit more.
"It’s healthy competition but whatever I can learn from him will help me in the long run. He’s scored a lot of goals in his career playing in that position. It can only help me going forward."
Conte has told Sessegnon what he expects from him during what is set to be a big season for the club under the Italian.
"To be more effective. Defensively last season I think I was very good. You can always improve on that as well but my aim this season is to score more goals and more assists," he said. "More goals and assists will keep me in the team so that’s my aim.
"Before I signed at the club I was scoring a lot of goals at Fulham so I just want to get back to that this season. My aim is to play many games for Spurs. To get through the season strong and play many games. Then we’ll see what happens after that."
It was pointed out to Sessegnon that he looks like he has been bulking up and he admitted that he has been trying to do that with not only his upper body but also to strengthen his legs around those troublesome hamstring muscles.
"I used the off season as an opportunity to get muscle into my legs – and my top as well. If you can see the difference then obviously it’s worked," he said. "To make myself stronger and play more games, to have the capability to go up and down for the full 90 minutes. That’s one of my aims, to play most games available this season.
"I had a solid two weeks out in Portugal just before pre-season started, working with a trainer. Double sessions every day, upper body, lower body and just running a lot. Free weights and squats, hamstring work, obviously, because of my history.
"Making myself stronger in every aspect. It will help for sure, 100 per cent, because last season I was getting these injuries because places around my hamstring wasn’t very strong. I’ve managed to work in the off season doing all this stuff on my hips and my glutes to make it stronger in every area.
"I’ve moved the extra [muscle weight] around. I feel a bit strong. The running we’re doing at the moment any weight we put on we’re losing straight away."
Sessegnon has been impressed by the club's new arrivals - "the signings have been good and everyone’s fitted in well" - but it is one player already at the club and shining at the top level that the young wide man has forged a growing partnership with - Son Heung-min.
"We have a good partnership on the left. The more you play with him the more you understand his movement," said Sessegnon. "The back end of last season I played a few more games and we were connecting well down the left side. His movement is very good and that makes him easy to play with. It’s all about communicating on the left when you don’t have the ball. So far it’s going good."
One of Sessegnon's England U21 team-mates, Djed Spence, is set to sign for the club once the final documents are signed between Middlesbrough and Tottenham and the Spurs man knows the right wing-back well.
"I know him from Fulham growing up. We played together in the Fulham academy. From what I’ve seen he’s an attacking full-back but that’s all I can say at the moment," he said.
Tottenham will be hoping that eventually Sessegnon and Spence bring similar success to their flanks as another British full-back pair did in Danny Rose and Kyle Walker under Mauricio Pochettino. Both their young successors have plenty of talent and now just need to establish themselves as Premier League stars.
Ryan Sessegnon was speaking at a girls football coaching event hosted by Nike and Active Modoo
READ NEXT:
- Troy Parrott explains what Antonio Conte told him he wants from him as a Tottenham striker
- Tottenham news and transfers LIVE: All the latest updates and rumours from the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium
- Full Tottenham Premier League fixture list for 2022/23
- The strange Son Heung-min press conference in South Korea that confused the UK media
Every word Hugo Lloris said on Clement Lenglet and why he's excited about Spurs' ambition
