Marcus Dinanga nets four in Spurs friendly
Bromley welcomed a Spurs XI to The CopperJax Community Stadium onTuesday night for the first instalment of pre-season, with Andy Woodman’s men warming up for the 2025/26 League Two campaign. The two sides last met in 2022, where Spurs triumphed 2-0, courtesy of a brace from Romain Mundle.
It was the visitors that had the first notable chance of the game, after Reiss Russell-Denny struck a free kick low towards Grant Smith’s bottom right hand corner, prompting a sturdy save from the Bromley number one. Russell-Denny found himself at the centre of attention again minutes later, as Spurs were awarded a penalty as a result of a mistimed challenge. The number six tiptoed up to the spot, before cooly brushing past Smith to give his side a 1-0 lead.
Omar Sowunmi thought he had levelled proceedings 15 minutes in, after Brooklyn Ilunga’s corner looped onto the centre-back’s head; his header back across goal narrowly cleared the crossbar.
One became two for the North London side within 20 minutes, as Luca Gunter’s goal kick flew past everybody, before placing itself at the feet of Tyrese Hall, who simply tucked past Smith for 2-0.
Bromley reduced the deficit on 40 minutes, after an inch-perfect through-ball from Nathan Paul–Lavaly allowed Soul Kader to fire first-time towards goal, and his shot hurtled past a defenceless Gunter between the sticks into the top left-hand corner.
The second half brought with it the introduction of 10 new players for Bromley, with a complete change of the team, excluding Marcus Ifill, who remained on the pitch after being brought on just before half time to replace Paul-Lavaly.
The hosts drew level 55 minutes in after Mitchell Pinnock did well to bully his man off the ball in the opposition penalty area, before deftly chipping towards the six-yard box, where Marcus Dinanga was positioned. Dinanga didn’t need to be asked twice, and he headed home from point-blank range to mark his return with a goal, making it 2-2.
Dinanga doubled his tally for the evening, as he capitalised on a messy scramble for the ball in the Spurs penalty area, before being the first to react, and he prodded past Gunter for the second time in five minutes to give the Ravens the lead.
Tottenham made five substitutions on the 60 minute mark.
Bromley were beginning to run rampant, and Dinanga was certainly in the scoring mood. Marcus Ifill’s darting run pierced the heart of the Spurs midfield, and the number 26 evaded a number of challenges, before slipping Dinanga in behind the Hotspur backline. The frontman took one look at the target in front of him, before thrashing into the roof of the net to complete a 12 minute hat-trick, the cherry on top of an exquisite performance.
A hat-trick on his first game back after a season-ending injury is a huge achievement for Marcus Dinanga… but netting four is even better, and the number 10 did just that, scoring his fourth and Bromley’s fifth in the 80th minute, stemming from luscious link up play between Dinanga and Ifill once again.
The referee’s whistle confirmed a 5-2 win for Andy Woodman’s men. Next up, we face Rotherham United in Portugal this Friday, and our next home game is against a Chelsea XI on Saturday the 19th July.