Tottenham Hotspur are being linked with Japan international defender Kota Takai. We take a look at the 20-year-old’s stats to see how he’d fit in at Spurs.
Ange Postecoglou enjoyed a successful time in Japan with Yokohama F. Marinos, guiding them to their first J. League title in 15 years in 2019.
He also did very well at Celtic, where he brought a number of players from Japan to Scotland to great effect, such as Kyogo Furuhashi, Daizen Maeda and Reo Hatate, among others.
Somewhat surprisingly, Postecoglou didn’t dip into the Japanese market during his time at Tottenham Hotspur, but just a few weeks after sacking the Australian, the Premier League club look like they might be adding a player to their ranks directly from the J. League.
Kota Takai would become only the second Japanese player ever to represent Spurs after Kazuyuki Toda, should his reported move from Kawasaki Frontale go through, and it wouldn’t be a surprise if this was a deal that was planned while Postecoglou was still in situ in north London.
New boss Thomas Frank has presumably given the incoming player his seal of approval, though. It’s an understandable move after a campaign in which Spurs suffered badly from injuries to centre-backs.
Cristian Romero and Micky van de Ven were a relatively reliable pairing performance-wise on the few occasions they were both fit to start in 2024-25. They started just 11 Premier League games together, and only finished seven, with Radu Dragusin and young midfielder Archie Gray (6) the next most frequent centre-back pairing in the league for Postecoglou’s side.
Tottenham won the UEFA Europa League final against Manchester United with their main pair at the back, but struggled in the league, having to largely cope without them, finishing in 17th place.
That said, Spurs now have an array of centre-back options. Kevin Danso arrived on loan in January and that move has since been made permanent, while Ben Davies recently had his contract extended by another year to 2026. In Romero, Van de Ven, Dragusin, Danso and Davies, Frank already has five senior options available to him, but he also has some promising youngsters in Alfie Dorrington, Ashley Phillips, and another imminent new arrival in 18-year-old Croatia international Luka Vuskovic.
Adding another in Takai therefore seems like it might be overkill, but after the season Spurs had at the back, it’s hard to blame them for stockpiling, especially with Romero and Van de Ven’s respective injury records. There is also a decent chance Dorrington and Phillips will be loaned out or possibly sold, while there are some question marks over the future of Dragusin, who hasn’t played since the end of January after suffering an ACL injury and when he did before the injury, looked like a significant downgrade on Romero and Van de Ven.
So, what would Spurs be getting with Takai?
The path between Kawasaki Frontale and European football is a relatively well-trodden one. Other players to have come through the Kawasaki academy before establishing themselves in Europe’s top five leagues include Brighton’s Kaoru Mitoma, Borussia Monchengladbach’s Ko Itakura and Real Sociedad’s Takefusa Kubo, while Ao Tanaka impressed last season in the Championship as Leeds United sealed promotion to the Premier League.
The reported fee of £5 million would be a record sale for a J. League club to an overseas team, and it would likely be even more were the player not in the final six months of his current deal.
At the age of just 20, Takai has already become a key figure at Kawasaki. He played a big role in them reaching the 2025 AFC Champions League final, where they were beaten by Al-Ahli. They did beat Cristiano Ronaldo’s Al-Nassr in the semi-finals, though, with Takai playing the full game in a 3-2 victory as he helped keep the Portuguese legend and strike partner Jhon Durán quiet in April.
He has played in 19 of Kawasaki’s 20 J1 League games this season, scoring two goals. Only defensive midfielder Yuki Yamamoto (92) has won possession more times for Kawasaki in the league than Takai (84) in 2025.
As you can see from our shape analysis graphics below, Takai predominantly plays as the right-sided centre-back of a back four, though he has occasionally featured on the right of a back three.
Will he be able to handle the physicality of the Premier League? Well, since the start of last season, Takai has an above average success rate in duels, and especially in aerial duels. The average duel success rate for J1 League defenders since the start of 2024 is 57.7%, with Takai winning 59.0%. In the air, that success rate is even higher at 62.1% – again above the league average for defenders (59.0%), helped by standing at 6-foot-3. His aerial duel success rate in the 2025 season is at a very respectable 62.9%.
That will no doubt please Frank, who favours having centre-backs who are active in the air. Of defenders, only Newcastle United’s Dan Burn (224) and Ipswich Town’s Dara O’Shea (203) competed in more aerial duels than Brentford pair Nathan Collins (189) and Sepp van den Berg (172) in the Premier League last season.
Takai’s aerial ability is something Kawasaki try to take advantage of often, particularly from set-pieces. He has got on the end of more corners (7) and indirect free-kicks (33) than any other player at the club this season.
He has also been impressive generally in stopping players getting beyond him. Of the 86 J1 League players to have seen opponents attempt to dribble past them 100+ times since the start of the 2024 season, Takai’s 65% rate of successfully dispossessing his opponent is the sixth-best in the competition.
It seems unlikely Spurs will maintain the possession-focused and high-line approach that defined Postecoglou’s time at the club, save for the Europa League final, but Frank will still expect his defenders to be comfortable on the ball.
Takai has attempted more passes than any other Kawasaki player this season (1,063), with a decent completion rate of 88.2%, though there is only so much you can tell from a centre-back’s passing accuracy, given how many are made under little to no pressure.
There’s more to be learned from his numbers when carrying the ball. Since the start of 2024, Takai has averaged 5.9 progressive carries (moving with the ball at least five metres towards the opposition’s goal) per 90 minutes in the J1 League, and 48.5 metres per 90 from those carries upfield, showing how comfortable he is bringing the ball out of defence.
When looking at Opta’s Player Comparison Radars, it’s interesting to see who Takai’s numbers from this season most closely align with in Europe’s top five leagues from the 2024-25 campaign.
Toulouse defender and England Under-21 international Charlie Cresswell is the player considered to most closely resemble Takai’s output, but the third closest comparison is apparently Dean Huijsen, another 20-year-old centre-back who impressed so much in the Premier League with Bournemouth last season that he earned a £50m move to Real Madrid earlier this summer.
It, of course, must be borne in mind that it is a big step up in quality from the J1 League to the English Premier League. For example, Kawasaki are 191st in the Opta Power Rankings, the third best of J1 League teams, while the lowest ranked Premier League team are Sunderland in 124th.
Takai has already received senior international recognition, having made four appearances for Japan, including a start in their 6-0 thrashing of Indonesia in a World Cup 2026 qualifier earlier this month, playing on the right of a back three for the Samurai Blue.
Reports suggest he will be part of the first team squad next season at Spurs if he joins, but it seems unlikely Takai will see much football in England initially without more injuries to senior centre-backs.
Having another promising option for Frank to develop can’t hurt, though, and with a UEFA Champions League campaign to navigate, there will be plenty of games to go around.
If Takai can thrive in Europe like previous Kawasaki Frontale alumni, though, he will certainly be one to watch over the next few years.
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Who is Kota Takai? The Tottenham Target Comparable with Dean Huijsen Opta Analyst.
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