“I feel like I’ve known the girls for years now” - Martinez
It might just be over a month into her Spurs career, but Shekiera Martinez feels she has already been here for so much longer.
Arriving from West Ham United this summer ahead of the start of pre-season, this has arguably been key for the Germany international settling into her new home so quickly.
Specifically travelling on our performance camp in Spain over the last couple of weeks, where she had key minutes on the pitch for the first time as a Spurs player in our pre-season friendlies against Granada and Real Madrid alongside a number of intense training sessions.
However, it was the moments off the pitch that really caught the eye, spending her downtime with her new team-mates playing board games (which she brought on the camp!) and chatting to get to know people.
On our final day in Spain, after 12 intense days, we caught up with Shekiera to see how she reflected on the performance camp and how she has settled into her new surroundings.
“I would say I have settled in well,” she told us, following the end of the final training session. “The training camp was really intense with really high quality and was also hard with the temperature, but it's fun actually and I think we will be ready when we are back in England.
“It's actually been fun with the girls. It feels like I’ve known the girls for ages, I can be completely myself, so I enjoy the time with them. I really enjoy the time here. I think it's really important to have this time together and also helps us on the pitch.
“It's been only four weeks now, but it feels so much longer. I can't wait to get started. As I said, it's really, really high, the intensity is really high, the training has been really tough, so I can't wait until the league starts.”