Tottenham Hotspur plans to appoint former Borussia Dortmund legend Sebastian Kehl as sporting director if they successfully avoid relegation..

Sky Sports' resident renowned German transfer journalist Florian Plettenberg reported on Tuesday that Tottenham Hotspur plans to appoint former Borussia Dortmund legend Sebastian Kehl as sporting director if they successfully avoid relegation.

According to Plettenberg, this does not mean that current sporting director Johan Lange will be replaced. Instead, Spurs co-sporting director model, with both directors assisting each other without a clear distinction between them.

Spurs recognized Kehl's expertise during his time at Dortmund in scouting young, undiscovered, and talented players, as well as his ability to manage and plan the team's sporting department.

Currently, Spurs' management has held talks with Kehl's agent team but has not yet made a formal offer. Kehl himself has not yet decided whether to continue further discussions with the Premier League giants.

Plettenberg added that besides Tottenham, Kehl has also received offers from Hamburg.

The newly promoted Bundesliga side plans to appoint Kehl to solidify their position after their return to the top flight and gradually attempt to recapture their former glory as one of the country's strongest clubs.

In fact, Spurs is already operating under a co-sporting director model. Previously, Lange and his Italian colleague Fabio Paratici shared this position.

During his tenure, Paratici successfully helped Spurs acquire several key players from his former club, Juventus.

These players include Dejan Kulusevski, Rodrigo Bentancur, and current captain Cristian Romero.

Furthermore, he was a key figure behind the scenes in getting current Napoli head coach Antonio Conte to become Spurs' head coach.

However, Paratici was implicated in Juventus' "Capital Gains Scandal" (Plusvalenza) in March 2023 and was banned from all football-related matters by FIFA for two years.

He resigned a month later. For a period afterward, Lange served as Tottenham Hotspur's sole sporting director.

In October 2025, after Paratici's ban was lifted, he briefly returned to Spurs in the same position, but soon resigned again to become Fiorentina's new sporting director.

He is also one of the biggest contributors to I Viola's gradual recovery after a poor start to the season.

Sebastian Kehl, 46, is a former Germany international defensive midfielder who helped Die Mannschaft reach the runner-up position in the 2002 FIFA World Cup in Japan and South Korea.

He played for Borussia Dortmund for 13 years, from 2002 to 2015, winning the Bundesliga title three times and reaching the Champions League and Europa League finals once each, making him a true BVB legend.

After retiring, Kehl served as Dortmund's youth academy director in the summer of 2018, and in the summer of 2021, he succeeded his predecessor Michael Zorc as the club's new sporting director, a position he will hold until March 2026.

During his tenure, Kehl successfully signed and developed the immense potential of players such as Jadon Sancho, Erling Håland, Jamie Bynoe-Gittens, Jude Bellingham, Karim Adyemi, and Achraf Hakimi, becoming one of the most successful sporting directors in European football.

Image source: Internet / Sky Sports Germany