Spurs lag behind in race for striker while Levy plays hardball

With news that a loan-deal for Adrien Rabiot is close to completion, those aiming for this deal to be the first of many dominos to fall in terms of incoming transfers seem destined for disappointment.

After analysing Harry Kane’s importance to our current run, the justifiable conclusion is that a striker is a priority this window. So how are we fairing in our hunt at present?

Pipped by Pellegrini...again

The oil-rich Manchester City look set to sign Wilfried Bony for a fee of around £28m – Spurs meanwhile are left to rue the fact that the striker was available for around £16m last summer.

On from Bony, it looks like Manchester City may aim to beat Spurs again for another one of their striking targets – this time, Southampton’s Jay Rodriquez.

Rodriquez hasn’t played competitive football since rupturing his anterior cruciate ligament last April (ironically against City at the Etihad), but that hasn’t prevented interest in the player developing.

Southampton have reportedly offered their 25-year-old striker a new deal, but that, like his injury, has done little to ward off interest from ourselves, Liverpool and now City.

In December we reported that Mauricio Pochettino had turned his attention to Said Berahino, as Rodriquez’s recovery from injury was taking longer than expected.

Now, The Daily Mail think that Rodriquez could be available for a fee of around £20m – a similar fee attributed to Berahino. The dilemma for Spurs and their manager now must be – which striker is better value for money, and if it turns out to be Rodriquez – how can we trump the money bags of Manchester City.

Defoe a no-go

A week ago today, we told you that Jermain Defoe could be in line to play at White Hart Lane again – if he signs for Leicester City as expected. This news sparked up an interesting debate in our comments section as to whether we ourselves should look to recruit Defoe to ease the burden off Harry Kane.

Those in favour of bringing Defoe back to the club, in some playing capacity, look set to be disappointed. It has been reported that Defoe is currently using the training facilities at Hotspur Way to keep himself in shape –training with the development squad.

Now, Sky Sports believe that out of the reported 10 Premier League clubs interested in signing Defoe on a permanent basis, Spurs are not one of them. Sky go on to suggest that Sunderland, Crystal Palce, Hull or Leicester are the most likely destinations for the 32-year-old.

Cost of Levy costing us?

When Daniel Levy negotiated Hugo Lloris’ transfer to the club, Lyon president Jean-Michel Aulas said that it was the ‘hardest set of negotiations’ he had ‘experienced in 25 years’.

As fans, we’re well aware that our chairman looks to drive a hard bargain in the transfer market and over the years we have both benefited and lost out because of it. Now it looks as though we may lose out, as reports suggest that the club are pricing out a move away from the club for Younes Kaboul.

Besiktas have rumoured to have bid £3m to acquire our captain’s services – a bid that has been rejected by the club. And Besiktas President Ahmed Nur Cebi insists that his club will look elsewhere if Spurs’ asking price remains the same. The president said: "The Tottenham player is in our transfer list but if material conditions stay as they are it does not seem possible to realise this transfer.”

In the market, £3m is a small-price for a senior player such as Younes Kaboul. However, others will argue that we should take the money offered, considering the player’s poor form and reduced role in the team.

 

I'm so disgusted with these possible rumours and losses of potential signings. Are we not respected as a club giant anymore? You're telling me that we can't seem to convince one worldclass goalscorer to help out our overworked King Kane?

 

A few points to uncouple here:
i) With the abundance of talent Man City have upfront, why they would want to sign Jay Rodriguez for £20million is beyond me. We have here a striker still recovering from a major injury which has ruled him out of any football for close on 9 months so far. No one seems to know if and when we will see him next on a football pitch. As to his form when he comes back, that is in the lap of the gods as far as I'm concerned. It would be financially idiotic in the extreme to shell out that mad amount of money for any player, Messi included, in these sort of circumstances. He will have to come out this month and show last season's form from now till the end of this season, and also that there are no lasting effects, fitness wise, of his injuries for anyone to consider paying anywhere near that kind of money. Considering that the 3 players they sold to Liverpool, plus the dud they offloaded to the woolwich have so far not come up to expectations, Southampton are going to find it very difficult to sell any club the idea that Rodriguez is worth £20million. In short, this story is a non-starter, imo.
ii) Speaking of Kaboul, all we read , for the most part, are media stories and who knows what the truth is? All we know is that Daniel Levy and the board have a set strategy for negotiating transfers, for good or ill. It can be frustrating for us fans at times, but it's also produced spectacular results, starting with Michael Carrick all the way to Gareth Bale. I guess we live and die by our strategy. The Spurs board are charged with securing the financial viability of our club, and given the dark times we went through 20 years ago, I would rather they did their very best to secure our best financial interests in transfer negotiations than not.

 

Could not disagree more with the comment above. The problem at THFC is, has and always will be Levy. Typical accountant ,he knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. Yes he has made good profits on some players set against which there have been some spectacular cockups. But so what, all the good ones have been sold. And before anyone mentions Bale, what happened to the money? With the exception of Erikson the rest of the £100m was pissed straight down the drain. More to the point in an investment sense his net spend on transfers in the last 5 years is the lowest of any team currently in the premiership. Even Burnley have a higher net spend! Mr P&L will never put his hand in his pocket. He never intends to build a new stadium not unless he finds someone else to fund it. Nearly ten years of screwing around and what have we got? A new Sainsburys. Sold Berbatov Sold Modric Sold Bale. Nice little earner. Why? Do you know he personally owns 20% of the total THFC shareholding. Nice little Divi's. As for his competence, how many managers has he fired? But who hired them? Any other CEO in business with that track record would have been fired years ago! While Levy is there nothing will change.

 

I’m fed up with all the long negations taken to sign up top players. We should get in and out of the transfer market early to snare our key targets rather than dragging negations on just to try and save a few quid only to be left with a choice of targets that no one else wants. Not many clubs are going to let a prized asset leave on deadline day. Mr Levy should note that we are not in the champions league so I would expect to pay more to secure these players. I would have liked to seen moves for Bony and Benteke last summer now that would have been some forward line along with Kane!!!
But again we go in too cheap and too slow. These three strikers would have set us up for years to come. Wonder what they would be worth now compared to the summer?

Note Benteke may still be open to a new bid?
Soldado and Ad need to go. We are going to make a loss on these two players but holding out for silly money may prevent us signing anyone descent and is that any good for the team or for business. We need to stop looking for bargains and get in more quality and act more decisively. We need three descent strikers, our best result this season is beating Chelski 5-3 however we let in three goals which would normally mean a defeat. Liverpool where the same when they nearly won the prem last season. You can afford to let in the odd goal here and there if you banging in five at the other end!
So please get out there and buy, buy, buy TWO real quality strikers.

 

anyone remember how upset us Spurs fans were collectively when we did not sign Gary Hooper...

 

Levy is a Grade A muppet who thinks hes better and bigger than the club with his limp egotistical theology.
Were working on less budget than promoted teams year after year and paying top dollar for the privilage, and by privilage i mean getting to watch the breath taking talents of Rose, Naughton etc
Hes more interested in fiddling a Zeki Fryers move for peanuts than he is about going out and buying Bony or Benteke who would massively improve the club. While at the same time making the current manager work with only 1 viable forward and paying wages etc for the unbelievable amount of deadwood at the club.
The bloke is a charlatan who has too big a strangle hold on the club. Happy clappers and such actively support the agenda of were not a big club we cant compete nonsense well one things for certain we wont ever compete under this current regime its simply not viable.
Fans spend thier money and expect money to be spent on the team not a glorified swapsies budget.
How much snoozing and penny pinching has cost us re CL qualification etc recently a lot more than weve saved garuanteed, and while we continue to stagnate the teams were chasing move further away and the teams around us get better.
Emporer Ming the Penniless is holding this club back way more than any Stadium.
Levy & Enic OUT!!!!!!

 

Felon - I've always been on the fence on the whole Levy/Enic strategy but I'm tending to agree with u these days. Yeah financially we are very well run compared to the Irving Scholar days etc. But we've seen so many false dawns and missed opportunities under levy when we have been well placed to push on. How many times would a 20m investment have made us millions in CL money?? Or maybe a trophy or two. How many players has he cost us that could have made the difference over haggling a few Bob -bony and benteke before they signed new deals last summer. Schneiderlin also. Hazard willian Oscar Remy all had advanced talks with spurs before they progressed and their value went up. Same with delph and Reid he will try and wait til summer to get them on a free rather than shell out now when they will choose elsewhere once they are free agents. Spurs will be overtaken by west ham once they get in that new stadium u watch. !!

 

Talking about talent, here's someone who would help our attack no end, and probably not for mad money either: http://www.fourfourtwo.com/features...-who-could-have-his-pick-premier-league-clubs

Those of you who watch Bundesliga football either on BT Sport or the highlight package on ITV4 will know what I'm talking about.

 

This is another copy and paste job from another Spurs website, THBN, but it bears reading: Tuesday, 13 January 2015
Former Tottenham centre-back, John Scales, was being a little simplistic with Sky Sports simply suggesting Tottenham need to buy players, even if they are not quality without explaining that at the moment it is impossible to buy non-home grown players.

"They have got so many games, that is the problem. I think they have played 32 games already and they have got League Cup, FA Cup and Europa League games to come. "So the demands on that squad are great. Pochettino will be looking for Daniel Levy come back into the market and strengthen their squad and add numbers as much as anything and you want to add quality if you can as well."
You are only allowed 17 non-home grown players in any Premier League squad. Tottenham already have 17 so until someone is sold they can't buy, otherwise they could be stuck paying two lots of wages, one for a player who can't play in half the games.
Spurs Non-Home Grown Players
1. Hugo Lloris - Goalkeeper
2. Younes Kaboul - Defender
3. Jan Vertonghen - Defender
4. Vlad Chiriches - Defender
5. Paulinho - Midfielder
6. Roberto Soldado - Forward
7. Emmanuel Adebayor - Forward
8. Erik Lamela - Midfielder
9. DeAndre Yedlin - Defender
10. Michel Vorm - Goalkeeper
11. Mousa Dembélé - Midfielder
12. Federico Fazio - Defender
13. Nacer Chadli - Midfielder
14. Christian Eriksen - Midfielder
15. Brad Friedel - Goalkeeper
16. Benjamin Stambouli - Midfielder
17. Etienne Capoue - Midfielder
18. Cristian Ceballos - Midfielder
19. Benoit Assou-Ekotto Defender
20. Bongani Khumalo - Defender
From that list Bongani Khumalo isn't in the Premier League squad and neither is Benoit Assou-Ekotto. DeAndre Yedlin has just arrived and his non-home grown status doesn't kick in until next season due to his age I believe.
That leaves the 17 we are allowed so to buy any non-home grown player like Wilfried Bony for arguments sake, we have to remove one or more of the remaining 17 above. We can't pay more wages for a player we can't use so all those fans hankering for a purchase, for their own benefit not the clubs, need to understand the position.There is no point loaning a player out and buying one in as then we have too many players in the summer and clubs who know you have to sell are not going to offer you anything other than a low offer. I wrote before the summer transfer window that we had to start then planning for the summer transfer window coming up, but we didn't. Now we have the same problem and we look as though we are going to have it again come July. Shifting Lennon is all well and good, it will give us some money but we still wouldn't be able to buy a Wilfried Bony, a Hector Moreno because Lennon is home grown, they are not. You can't force a club to buy your player and you can't force a player to join a club he doesn't want to or who won't pay him enough. Franco Baldini has his work cut out selling those no longer required. - See more at: http://tottenhamhotspur.blogspot.co.uk/#sthash.GhX0sEaO.dpuf

 

I remember the comments made by Lyon's president re Levy's negotiations. Typical penny pinching Levy and yes he occasionally picks up fantastic bargain such as Lloris but missing out on players like Benteke and Bony who were both available as well as achievable is almost criminal. Benteke wanted to sign for us yet we ended up with Soldado. Our transfer policies are and have been an embarrassment to this club in recent years, you could also add the name Suarez to that list of players that we could have bought.

 

Yer it pisses me off i recall getting a flag printed for the game when we played against Bestkias in 2006? Yer i was living and working in Plymouth, but i thought fcuk it lets go got to go. 6 Hour half day to Kent to get passport upto to Standstead. £ 329 fly and return same day/night with 200 Oldens Spurs, you know 40 -50 gezzes. We won 0 2. But years earlier my older flag got nicked by a Northern gent. (****).

But yes i went to the Italy 0 England 0 World Cup Qualifier years earlier 1997, ( a loss we don't make the World Cup that year). Yep fully cotton double sided stitched from Chatham Royal Navy Docks hand stitched my love. (1:36)



Sadly thats the last i saw of my original girl Jack.

 

I hate to say it but we haven't been considered a big club for many years. Ths is due to levy.

 

I am with Cockerel on this one. ENIC objective is to make money, not to collect silverware. Well, since silverware brings money in by numerous channels, they would like to collect it, obviously. But it is not( and it should not be) their PRIMARY objective. And I approve it. At the end it is a correct way to run a football club.
Yet Levy is not just an evil accountant that many perceive him to be. Levy may look like an ugly robot, but inside he is a Spurs supporter. He is one of us, no matter how weird it sounds. Do you want him to spend money the way he had done after Bale sale? Shell out 30 to 50 millions right away? Get another Soldado, Paulinho? He has done it when his supporter side overcame his accountant side and every one now blames him for money wasted ( BTW, I think Eriksen, Chadli and Lamela are the assets). His supporter side fired quite a few managers recently, yet his accountant side holds him off from paying Josif what Arch Metal want to clear out the way for stadium construction. Look, there are much worse owners out there. At least this one keeps money in the club pocket and also cares somehow, no matter how convoluted it appears.
Hard to negotiate with? I think it is a plus. Keep in mind all those guys are playing games with their statements. Sure, Beshiktas prez should have said they would not bent over to Levy's demands, but whether it is truth or not only time can tell. We played them, they need CB and Kaboul could help them, without a doubt. So it is a waiting game. Everyone and their mothers know that Spurs must sell before they get out and buy. So potential buyers want to get our deadwood cheap. Levy's job is to get them sold for as high as possible. Whatever possible is beyond this forum or any media outlet ability to know. We and them can only speculate.