Tottenham Hotspur made some moves on deadline day, and some names left north London, one being Spain international Bryan Gil. The forward is heading out on a loan deal to Valencia, which doesn’t include a purchase option.
Giving Gil more playing time to develop isn’t the wrong approach. However, Sky Sports reporter Michael Bridge questions the decision to loan Gil back to a La Liga club and not to a Premier League club to allow him to adjust to the league with a more significant role.
“What’s the point? The thing is, we know he can play well against Eibar and Cadiz; we want to see him in the Premier League,” Bridge told Give Me Sport.
“And now if you’re telling me that not one Premier League club fancied him on a season-long loan, we’ve got problems because that’s telling me that he isn’t good enough for this league.”
Spurs bought in the 20-year-old last summer for £21.6 million, with Erik Lamela heading the other way to Sevilla.
Gil signed a five-year contract, but his integration into the squad hasn’t gone as planned. The Spain international made 20 total appearances, but he’s averaging only 11 minutes per game in Premier League competition.
The forward will return to start next season, hoping to push for more playing time and help the forward group.
If he’s not playing there’s no point him hanging around just training and missing his folks, as long as he’s played more there it makes sense.
It’s obvious that Conte didn’t feel that Gil was going to be involved so it was better all round to go and keep developing with regular football. He’s not robust enough to be starting in the Premiership just yet. Also though, I don’t think he fits Conte’s preferred system of play either.
He said his mother wanted him back in Spain.
Disagree with Bridge. If he went on loan to PL club he would have spent much of his time on the bench. Its a good idea to go back to La Liga and get some game time into his legs. He’s only 20 so I he see him going out on loan again next year perhaps to a PL club when hes beefed up a bit.
Lets hope he turns into Neymar one day!
Paying £22m plus Lamela for him was dumb. Loaning him back to the Spanish league was dumber.