Kevin Danso will certainly not be taking his Tottenham transfer for granted. After wowing in Ligue 1 with Lens, the Austrian international completed a move to Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Sunday morning.

Danso has joined Spurs on a loan deal until the end of the 2024/25 campaign, with an obligation to make the move permanent in the summer. The 26-year-old will add to Ange Postecoglou's options at centre-back and there is a possibility that his debut could come on Thursday evening when Tottenham travel to Liverpool for the second leg of their Carabao Cup semi-final clash.

Born in Austria but spending a large portion of his childhood in England and playing for Reading and MK Dons during his youth, Danso headed for Germany in 2014 as he linked up with Bundesliga club Augsburg. Making his senior debut for the club in March 2017, two years later the defender returned to England after joining Southampton on a season-long loan deal.

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His spell at St Mary's started off well but he would finish the campaign having only played in 10 games in all competitions for Saints. Danso's final Premier League appearance came against Manchester City at the beginning of October, with the player missing out on the matchday squad in the league 14 times after his outing at the Etihad Stadium.

Very much a hugely disappointing season for the highly-rated player, he went on loan to Fortuna Dusseldorf the following year and got his career back on track. That in turn resulted in his move to Lens, with Spurs then signing him from the French club on Sunday.

Now a Premier League player once again, Danso will be looking to make up for lost time and prove a point that he does after all belong in England's top flight. His frustrating spell at Southampton is something he has taken full responsibility for and he knows never to take his foot off the gas and always to push for more, which is now something that may only bode well for Postecoglou and Tottenham in the years to come.

"Two very different loans spell. I had been at Augsburg for about five years, two years as a pro, and obviously at that age I didn't feel like I was getting enough playing time. Obviously being young, the most important thing is actually playing and just to gain experience," said the defender in his interview with Rising Ballers.

"I think when you're young, you dream of being a football player, you dream of playing at the highest level and you can only do that by playing games and showing your potential. I didn't feel like I was getting that at Augsburg anymore. Being from the academy, obviously they have established players that have been playing there for years and some playing at bigger clubs and then coming to Augsburg.

"After the Under-21 Euros, which I did really well in, we got eliminated in a group stage but I had two very good games and one decent game, I just wanted to make that next step. I had a lot of offers from Italy and from Germany as well, but I think being from England, growing up in England, dreaming of always playing in the Premier League, I chose Southampton.

"I started off amazingly, I started off really well and I was playing left-back and I was a centre-back. I started off playing left-back, played right-back, played one game or two games at centre-back. Like I said, I started off really well and then started playing less and less, which is quite frankly my own fault as well. I take responsibility for that.

"I've got to the Premier League, playing in the Premier League and it's a dream come true, so I started taking my foot off the gas a bit. I think that's the point in my career I learnt most about myself and I just really understood what it took if you want your dreams to become a reality, like the work you have to put in and I learnt that from a lot of the players at Southampton.

"Even though I wasn't playing a lot then after a few months, just the support from the players, the likes of Ryan Bertrand, Nathan Redmond and, which I will always say, James Ward-Prowse, just the professionalism, the things that he put in place, the things he did. I definitely took a leaf out of his book because he's the the most professional player I've ever played with. There's no stone unturned and he just works at everything.

"That's when I thought, 'okay, you can never take your foot off the gas' because if you want to be a player at a high level, you've got to work as hard as some of these players did and change your mentality. I learnt a lot from those players around me.

"I started amazing and I was playing, and I was doing well and then, like I said, taking your foot off the gas and you can't afford to do that, especially in the Premier League, which is definitely the toughest league I've played in so far.

"After obviously not playing a lot, not doing anything, I went back to Augsburg and then went on loan again to Fortuna Dusseldorf. I was in 2.Bundesliga and the first few games didn't go so well because I was playing a little bit with a chip on my shoulder that I shouldn't be here. My level is the Premier League. I've already kind of showed that I can play at the highest level, I'd played in the Bundesliga. Like why am I here?

"When you take a foot of the gas that's normally what happens and the first few games didn't go so well. I was playing but I wasn't playing amazingly and then I think the minute where I realized that I was like, actually I really just have to be head and shoulders above the rest of everybody, the people in the league, was when we went to play, and no disrespect to them, Wurzburger Kickers.

"Nobody probably would have heard of them but from playing at the Etihad Stadium to Wurzburger Kickers' stadium was the absolute wake-up call for me. You dream as a kid to be playing at the stadiums like the Etihad, Old Trafford and Anfield on these big stages and then here I am playing at the Wurzburger Kickers' stadium.

"From that point on now my head was screwed on and I was fully focused. Then I had a really good rest of the season for Dusseldorf and I think it was something like I was man of the match for Dusseldorf in 30% of the matches for the whole season. I think it was a good decision to go to the 2.Bundesliga just as a wake-up call and to just to prove myself that this isn't actually where I belong and I have the potential to be better.

"It's just about proving that every day and that's what I learnt from that loan spell that it doesn't matter how much potential you have, how good you think you are, you actually have to prove it every day in every training session and in every game.

"You can't take your foot off the gas and I think you see it in football a lot that there's players with loads of potential that then don't end up making it. I've played with some amazing players that definitely should have made it but I think they played too long in their comfort zone or I think they believed that their potential would get them to where they think they should be but the reality is if that you've go to work hard."

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