Heung-Min Son – Tottenham Hotspur

Heung-Min Son Player Profile

Heung-Min Son is a fast and clinical forward who plays primarily as a left winger, but he is adept at playing as a right winger and as a centre forward. He joined Tottenham Hotspur from Bayer Leverkusen for a reported fee of £22m on 28^th August 2015.

Son began his youth football career in his native South Korea with FC Seoul in 2008, before officially joining German Giants Hamburger SV in November 2009 after returning to South Korea and participating in the FIFA U-17 World Cup.

He went on to sign his first professional deal aged 18 after an impressive nine goal return in the pre-season ahead of the 2010/11 Bundesliga season. After an unfortunate foot injury, he returned to action on Saturday, 30^th October 2010 where he went on to score his first ever professional goal in a Bundesliga (German Top Flight) against FC Köln.

By scoring that goal he also broke a record held by Manfred Kaltz in becoming the youngest Hamburg player to score a goal in the Bundesliga in the club’s history.

Son’s record stood until German striker Fiete Arp broke the record aged 17 almost exactly 7 years later on 28^th October 2017.

In his first full season as a professional footballer (2010/11), Son made 14 appearances in all competitions for Die Rothosen, scoring 3 goals with the club finishing in 8^th place with 45 points.

Son’s best season for the former European Cup winners was in the 2012/13 season, his last one at the club, where here scored 12 goals, providing 2 assists in his 34 appearances in all competitions. Hamburg finished in 7^th place that season, with just two points separating themselves and European Football.

The forward signed for Bayer Leverkusen for a fee reported to be in the region of €12.5m (£11.1m) on Thursday 13^th June 2013.

The South Korean had a very successful first season with Die Werkself (2013/14), scoring 12 goals and providing 7 assists for his teammates in 43 appearances in all competitions. This included a league hat-trick against old club Hamburger SV and a crucial goal to secure Leverkusen Champions League football against Werder Bremen. Son and Leverkusen finished in 4^th place with 61 points.

Overall, he made 29 goals and got 11 assists in 87 appearances in all competitions.

Mauricio Pochettino’s Spurs signed Son on 28^th August 2015 for a reported fee of around £22m. Tottenham finished in his first season (2015/16), where he scored 8 goals with 5 assists to boot in 42 games. The club finished in 3^rd that season with 70 points.

In Son’s second season (2016/17), Spurs came even closer to winning the Premier League title, finishing in second place with 86 points, with only Chelsea above them (Chelsea were managed by Antonio Conte at the time!). The South Korean scored 21 goals in 47 appearances in all competitions with 9 assists to boot.

Last season (2021/22), Son claimed the Premier League Golden Boot alongside Mohamed Salah, scoring 23 goals over the course of the season. Tottenham finished in 4^th last season with 71 points, qualifying for European Football. A bonus for Spurs fans was finishing ahead of North London rivals Arsenal.

Overall, at the time of writing, Heung-Min Son has made 355 appearances in all for Spurs, scoring an extraordinary 139 goals with 77 assists to date.