According to Dave Kidd for The Sun, José Mourinho could suddenly be in the money. The suggestion is that Manchester City could be willing to pay £40million or thereabouts for the Tottenham midfielder.
If Tottenham can move on Harry Winks for decent money, then it would be a seminal moment for the Portuguese coach who was first frustrated by injuries and then by a pandemic that wiped out his chances of even modest spending this summer.
The arrival of the keenly priced Højbjerg has placed even greater pressure for places in a Spurs midfield brimming with talent, but few genuine superstars.
Winks is undoubtedly a technically accomplished player, with passing accuracies that are permanently in the 90th percentile, but dear lord what he tangibly achieves remains a mystery to me.
I’ve made the point before now that coaches ought to have taken Winks in hand long before now and given him an identity as a footballer, alas, that clearly never happened, and what Spurs have developed is a faithful metronome.
£40million ONO would go a long way to giving Mourinho a chance to continue his salvage job at Tottenham, and give Winks a chance to do more with his career than rack up meaningless appearances.
We appear to have an upgrade in Winks now in PEH.
Skrinar, Castagne, Grelish and maybe Wilson from Bournemouth as back up to Kane would be an outstanding window, we could even replace Lamela with Benrama from Brentford, but I think we are good for wingers.
Poch wasn’t allowed to rebuild even after no players coming in for the previous 12 months. Levy wanted top 4 despite neglect of the transfer situation, he gets what he deserves here, even if he doesn’t like football. Just a shame for everyone else…
I agree that the back four need someone in front of them, is this boy of the quality required for Spurs?
WE get it you dont like PEH its good to be different. Most of us are sick of watching our defence being shielded by a Marshmallow and a Forrest
Winks has undoubtedly been programmed to play that way, and I’d like to think he has more to offer, I’d be surprised if citeh are genuinely interested, although they do need a replacement for the ageing Fernandinho, but Winks is not that for sure and he’s no Parker either. I don’t like him and Sissoko together and one has to go, so it’s so long Siss for me.
Yep Dybala and Grelish for £90M last season, as it turns out, would have been spectacular, hey ho. Glelish for £50M Id take now tho.
That’s a lot of money for a Scottie Parker clone. I’d take it and invest it back into a couple of good signing and keep N’Dombele.
But if Winks does go, we should keep Sissy – as no doubt the un-injurable Holjberg will do an ACL in the Europa qualifying games.
Milosavic Savic is a good player, but the English quota thing is important
Believe what you want James,Levy would probably not have even have heard of ,LoCelso,and N’dombele and certainly not wanted to spend £95.8m on signing them if he had his way. Gazaniga & Foyth if you weren’t Argentinian I’d be surprised you knew they existed.Do you really not believe Poch discussed with the chief scouts and Levy the targets they were after and had a shortlist depending on the transfer fund available.He may not have got any players at the top of his list,but apart from 3 or 4 clubs in the PL that is the norm.
You would then need to replace Winks with another English player and they don’t come cheap,especially midfielders. That would be a bargain price for an England International for City. Good English midfielders are very hard to find, I would keep him and have Mourinho mould his game.
Whose list, Levy’s or Poch’s, Poch was just the coach as he famously pointed out.
Other than coming from “The Sun” is there anything to back this up.
Isn’t this just a story off the back of Spurs Signing PEH..?
£40mil? Wow! Tek that money and skarpa
I’m clearly in the minority here but I’d keep Winks. I see/read all the opinions/comments of others & think, what’s wrong with the job he does?
He’s not in the side to create but to ‘protect the back line’ which he does well (imo) & an 89.7% pass rate surely isn’t to be overlooked?
I believe Mourinho rates him, only Moura, Aurier, Alderweireld & Lo Celso played more games under JM so far & lets not forget homegrown (a major point most supporters overlook when thinking about squad recruitment, not as easy just to sell & buy & not keep quota!)
& how is Guardiola going to improve him? Winks is what he is, he won’t become a Kevin de Bruyne or David Silva, he’s a pretty solid, possession based, shielding CDM.
So IF Guardiola rates him & (more than likely) Mourinho does also, is he really that bad as a player that we should sell??
Yes still rather sell Dier out of the two however like you say if lamela could be included in the skriniar deal. We could get skriniar and a right back with the winks cash.
You must have more info than me,because Poch and Levy tried to bring in players in both windows.We didn’t do so bad getting to the CL final and finishing in the top four.Poch may have been offered short term solutions but prefared to wait for his targets of LoCelso & N’dombele.
I only know Utd are looking for another Leftback and are maybe interested in Chillwell.We were being quoted at having to pay a loan fee of £20m plus wages of £10m for Coutinho which I think could be better spent on buying someone.Arsenal paid £17m loan for Ceballos plus wages and wanted to buy him now,but all their 12mts coaching could be wasted as Real Madrid have seen an improvement and may keep him for next season. Poch was not a fan of a loan as he said we were just improving the player for the parent club and increasing their value.
The hope is that Hojberg will free Lo Celso and Ndombele of some of their defensive duties, so they can contribute more further forward.
I think United are putting all their current efforts (and most of their transfer fund) into Sancho, they need another CH also, any of their current options alongside McGuire are somewhat shaky. Grelish is down their pecking order. I like Coutiniho at number 10 also, a loan for him could work.
Don’t forget the 2 transfer windows where we didn’t buy a player!! That worked out well for us, didn’t it??!!!
I don’t believe the Bale rumours,Villa want £80m and if Utd don’t get Sancho they will be targeting Grealish next.Dont get me wrong I would like to see Grealish at Spurs next season also.
Well, obvs Levy wont pay full price for him. £50M has been quoted, which would be doable, (if we sell Winks) if we are looking at £650K a week Bale, who is probably past his fantastic best, a young hungrier, cheaper solution in Grelish may be better
Maybe Hojbjerg doing the dirty work would let Winks shine in a new role.
Where do we find the difference of £40m?
Do we think Grelish for Winks would be a good plan? It will solve our number 10 issue and Dele getting fit will help
Eriksen wanted to run down his contract,but getting £16m in Jan for a player who had downed tools and wanted out at all costs still retuned a profit after years of service.We know Levy won’t spend Enic’s money on big signings,but he gave Poch players on his list to the tune of £350m while only costing the club around £100m nett. Sometimes we forget if we made a profit ,it was because of his dealings saving the millions in the first place.
You make a fair point but he tried to sell Eriksen for circa £130 mill and ended up accepting £16 mill and there is a long list of good players he failed to sign over the years due to his intransigence.
Winks is home grown and loves the club. If Pep can see something in him, it goes to show that there is a player in there not just a metronomic robot. He is being played in the wrong position as he is not physical enough for DM. Properly coached, he could be improve offensively. Did Pep improve Kyle Walker or Sterling?
We took a gamble on our record signing N’dombele and its backfired.Levy saved £25m on the original asking price for LoCelso & £10m on N’Dombele.We were also told to pay £35m for Hojbjerg.
Very true.
One player loves Spurs and puts every ounce of energy into everything he does the other doesn’t give a sh#t.
We should be buying Upamecano, but of course we won’t.
Sometimes you have to take a gamble on a young player’s character and hope they realise the error of their ways and grow up. Alli still hasn’t. Levy’s offer to Villa was opportunistic as he likes to do in these types of situations. He managed to completely p*** off Villa, as he has done to numerous other PL and European clubs. Negotiating transfers is an art and Levy’s tactics don’t work any more. Levy is the sort of person who would steal from a blind beggar and he knows nothing about football.
The injury situation has affected him, and before people trash him completely he was getting back recently. He put in some very good performances, even under Jose recently. Jose might prefer to keep him and play him with PEH but old tight ar*e upstairs wants players out before bringing in. Winks or Tanguy for Jose right now?
Skrinar, Dier is staying tho. Selling Winks would pretty much pay for Skrinar, maybe throw Lamela into the pot also
You have a choice Dier or skriniar which would you rather have alongside Toby
Dier at CB is OK. At CM he was hopeless, if we can get NDombele fit and motivated, he is way better than Winks
Thats why we nned a top notch number 10 like Coutinho, a good deal younger an cheaper than Bale
Lack of goals from midfield,Hojbjerg ,LoCelso,N ‘dombele
Much rather they had bid for Dier. We are short on homegrown. Oh well go out and buy top quality to replace him. Any chance they could buy Ndombele too for 60 million
In the right system with the right players around you ‘near and tidy’ is key to what you do. Look at that Pep Barca side, they took neat and tidy and destroyed everyone with it.
Pep will improve him, Jose won’t so he might as well leave the sinking ship of Poch’s legacy while he’s got the chance…
Like I say, he’ll benefit from playing in Pep’s system and he’s probably seen the Iniesta in him. Probably get back in the England fold too. People are pinning a lot on PEH but I guess Jose needs is own dynamic.
I prefer footballers myself but there you go, you can be a footballer and also a leader. Going and getting someone who gets up and down and kicks people from Southampton isn’t exactly what most of us had in mind at ‘The Bottom Filling Pints Arena ‘… is it?
Look I like Winks, he is a home grown boy and a Spurs fan. However I dont think he will turn out any better than Skipp long term. If he stayed, he may be used as a closer by Jose, come in for the last 20 mins if we are ahead, to keep things tight. He will not be first choice, he maybe at City though, their central midfield is ageing, so if they offer £40M for him we should take it and invest, lets have a proper clear out and lose Rose, Aurier, CCV, Lamela and even Foyth if he inst going to be used. That lot would bring in around £90M to buy new players. My preferred first choice XI for next season would be : Lloris, Castagne, Sess (he needs to be moulded into our LB) Dier, Toby, PEH, Lo Celco, NDombelel, Coutiniho, Son and Kane. We could a long way with that… COYS!!!
He had shown potential but was still a gamble for his lifestyle off the pitch,and was on the front pages as often as the back.Villa wanted £25m (fanciful) and had been relegated they were in crisis and needed the money.Levy offered £6m plus Onomah total value £11m.A week later Villa were bought over and refused to sell at any price the rest is history. Even during lockdown Grealish was back in the papers for all the wrong reasons. Great player now but every club misses out on top talent from time to time.
PEH is a leader though, with a toughhim no nonsense streak.
He may not be the best footballer in the world, but it’s not all about technical ability, it’s also about character.
As for Winks he’s 24 now, and hasn’t shown a lot of improvement.
If he stays he will have to improve, but if he goes I wish all the best at Citeh for 36 games a season.
Blighted by lots of injuries simply making excuses for him Easty.
The harsh reality of the situation is that what you see is what you get with Winks neat and tidy. Thats it. End of!
Fair point where back to that old chestnut when Levy had he not wasted the opportunity could have secured Grealish for half the figure he is valued at now 2 years ago had he made a serious realistic offer instead of an insulting derisory bid!!
If Utd can’t get jadon Sancho they will go for Grealish and he wants the move,Levy won’t get into a bidding war. Villa want £80m. Milinkovic Savic maybe £60m,box to box midfielder 7 goals & 4 assists this season.
He’s had a lot of injuries which stallled his progress a bit. No point in him working with Jose, Pep however will know how to use him in the right way, although as a squad player and to make up their homegrown quota, as they did with Walker. I love the way we help other teams out don’t you? 😂
Personally think we are giving up on the boy too soon, potentially still better than PEH as he’s technically better anyway. However, if we are sticking with Tanguy and with Gio doing well already there will be a lack of spots, especially with the stone-age low block approach.
Go and win some big stuff Winksy, under a manager that understands you. You’ll win nothing under Levy. Kane to follow?
Eyebrows raised but lets get real he ain’t going to be sold on the cheap and why should he with the Villa Board keen to cash in on their prized asset as Levy will do on Kane!
I would immediately utlise the funds to make a £70m bid for Grealish!.
Alternatively utilising the monies elsewhere!
Likewise I welcome the sale as I am not sure what he brings to the party??
I would welcome this sale. Winks will not get into our first choice midfield now so for that money for a second string player is excellent. Only issue for me is we have to be careful with our homegrown quota – we need another Englishman to take his place.