Timo Werner to Spurs: Euro 2024 looms large in decision

This won't be the first time Timo Werner has swapped Leipzig for London. But it is the first time he's done so with quite so much to prove. When the forward moved from RB Leipzig to Chelsea in 2020, he was Germany's first-choice striker and hottest property after a 28-goal Bundesliga season.

He returns to the English capital three-and-a-half years later, this time to Tottenham Hotspur, having failed to make a Germany squad this season and with the homecoming project accepted as a failure.

"It's right that Timo is looking for a loan. Timo would like to go to the European Championship," RB  Leipzig coach Marco Rose told Sky Germany before the move was confirmed.

"We wish him all the best and keep our fingers crossed for him."

That the move, from Werner's perspective, is so nakedly about the tournament in Germany this summer is an acknowledgement of two things: firstly, Germany still lack attacking options and secondly, Werner is at a point where he has to try something to get his mojo back. But how did it come to this?

Chelsea struggles

Though he won the Champions League in west London, Werner's Chelsea spell was, at best, a qualified success, with just 10 Premier League goals in 56 games. Despite that, his work rate meant he was initially a fairly popular figure at Stamford Bridge and was given plenty of chances.

He seemed ready to take them when Thomas Tuchel replaced Frank Lampard as Cheslea coach six months into Werner's stay. But any thoughts the two Germans would work well together in the long term were disproved as the relationship between player, club and coach broke down.

"I scored the goals and played good games. When you come from the kind of success I had in Germany or with Chelsea — playing nearly every game in the first season, winning the Champions League in 2021, scoring in the semifinal against Real Madrid, making a lot of goals — then all this gets a little bit forgotten by the manager, it was not really fair,” said Werner after departing Chelsea to return to RB in 2022.

RB return

Just as Jadon Sancho seems to be doing with Borussia Dortmund, Werner returned to the scene of his early success.

"I want to look to the future because, like me, RB Leipzig have developed further in the last two years," he said at the time.

Again, it's not quite worked out like that, with Rose's happiness to let Werner out on a loan a clear indication of the forward's status. Werner has yet to play 90 minutes in any match this season, scoring just twice. At the same time, he's fallen way down the pecking order with Germany.

International ambitions

But the move to Spurs, partly to compensate for the temporary loss of former Bundesliga star Son Heung-min to the Asian Cup, offers a chance at redemption. Under Australian coach Ange Postecoglou, the North London outfit, are the sort of hard-running, attacking side that bought the best out of Werner in his first spell at Leipzig, while Son's absence creates a vacancy for Werner to cut in from the left, arguably his best role.

That the national team are now coached by Julian Nagelsmann offers Werner another glimmer of hope. The former Bayern Munich boss was in charge when Werner had his most prolific season, that 28-Bundesliga goal campaign in 2019-20, before the move to Chelsea.

While Nagelsmann has so far snubbed Werner in his Germany squads, only Niklas Füllkrug has come anywhere near being a reliable goal scorer for Germany in recent years, meaning any forward who enjoys a decent end to this season is in with a chance.

Should Werner do enough to convince Nagelsmann, he'll still have a point to prove in Euro 2024, having failed to score at any of his major tournament appearances. If that changes in Germany's opener against Scotland in Dortmund on June 14, the last few years might start to fade in significance.

Edited by: Chuck Penfold