Tottenham Hotspur defender Micky van de Ven scored a truly astonishing goal during the team's Champions League win over Copenhagen on Tuesday night, immediately reminding fans of one that club legend Son Heung-min netted against Burnley six years ago. Son's effort went on to win the coveted FIFA Puskas Award, leading supporters to already wish the same fate for Van de Ven.
Van de Ven runs length of the pitch
Van de Ven near enough covered the entire length of the pitch with the ball at his feet. The Dutch centre-back picked it up on the edge of his own penalty area and, aided by his well-known searing pace, proceeded to surge up the field. He initially burst through a gap between two Copenhagen players, and then sidestepped two more by the time he reached the halfway line. After that, it was a straight foot race towards goal, but no one was catching him.
Crucially, after the lung-busting run, Van de Ven still had the composure to fire off a clinical finish past visiting goalkeeper Dominik Kotarski.
In 2019, Son had collected the ball in the same area of the pitch. It wasn't quite the explosive start that Van de Ven managed and the finish was more measured and slightly closer to goal, but the run was extraordinarily similar and covered pretty much the same path.
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Van de Ven helps Spurs to easy win
Van de Ven's strike put Spurs 3-0 ahead against their Danish opponent, eventually going on to win 4-0. After the final whistle, he was immediately asked for his take on what had happened by TNT Sports: "To be honest, I saw the gap in front of me and started dribbling, and I will see if they can catch up. I saw the space more and more. At that moment, I thought, 'I'm through now, I'll go for goal now'. Then I scored."
Interviewer Becky Ives joked that the Tottenham medical department would have been worried about the condition of Van de Ven's hamstrings watching him run in full flight like that – in seriousness, he missed 30 games for club and country last season because of hamstring and thigh injuries.
He saw the funny side of that, but then replied: "I'm feeling good and I felt amazing in the sprint as well. I felt I could keep going and going, and I did."
Speaking after the game, head coach Thomas Frank joked: "It felt like we had Lionel Messi turned into Micky van de Ven, running down from his own goal and all the way to the other end to score a fantastic goal. I think he’s our top scorer in all competitions. He can keep going. He can keep, by the way, walking past me if he’s angry after a game if he delivers like this."
AFPVan de Ven: Puskas Award winner?
Son won the 2020 FIFA Puskas Award for an almost carbon copy of the goal, so Van de Ven has to be in contention for a prize of his own. But patience is going to be required.
Although the 2025 nominations have not yet been revealed ahead of FIFA's annual gala, likely to be in January 2026, the cutoff point tends to be August each yer and stretches back the previous 12 months. It means that goals scored so far in the 2025-26 season won't be considered until the time comes for the 2026 award to be handed out, which is expected to be at around 12 months or more away.
Because of the Covid-19 pandemic, Son did not get to attend a glitzy celebration to collect his Puskas Award, instead giving an acceptance speech via video in a virtual ceremony.
