Ligue 1 club OGC Nice’s sporting director has revealed that Tottenham goalkeeper Hugo Lloris’ agent tried to get his contract at Tottenham terminated in the later stages of the transfer window but insists the club never made an offer for him.
This comes after Hugo Lloris’ publicly stated that he rejected a last-minute offer from Nice because of a lack of a shared vision and a clear sporting project.
He claimed that he couldn’t sign with them as for him ‘playing prospects’ and the ‘sporting project’ is even more important than the ‘financial conditions’.
He said:
“Playing prospects and the sporting project, the real motors behind a player’s decision, much more so than financial conditions, weren’t clearly broached.”
”My professional journey has shown that exchange, sharing and collective growth have always forged my decisions, even more so when it’s about coming back to the club that trained me.
The supporters and the team deserve better than a split-second decision based on a phone call without expectations or a clear sporting project with one hour until the closure of the window at a time where I wasn’t expecting it.”
”To be honest, I couldn’t sign without this common shared vision, at least with the president and the coach. OGC Nice is, and will remain a different club for me. It is my city, my club, my blood. A goalkeeper (Bulka) is in place today.”
”He is without a doubt one of the best at the start of the season. He has a promising career ahead of him. Joining a club to play, to build, to perform, yes; signing without a sporting vision and a direct positive impact on the team, no.”
However, Ghisolfi countered Lloris’ claims, asserting that a concrete offer was never presented to the goalkeeper.
Ghisolfi revealed that Lloris’ agent attempted to terminate his contract with Tottenham in the final minutes of the transfer window, which would have facilitated a move to either elsewhere.
Ghisolfi stated that Nice had already chosen Marcin Bulka as their goalkeeper for the upcoming season, making it unlikely for Lloris to join as a backup.
While he acknowledged Lloris’s love for the club and the region, he emphasised that there was no formal offer on the table for the French international but kept the options open for the future.
Ghisolfi said (via Sport Witness):
“It’s a story that shows a lot about the current state of football and the impact of social media. In the last few minutes of the transfer window, an agent tried to get him to terminate his contract at Tottenham with the Nice carrot on the end on the end of the stick.
He then leaked the story of a refusal to get it. He didn’t refuse Nice because the club never concretely offered him anything.”
“As I told him at the end of last season, we chose [Marcin] Bulka. We never imagined, financially or on a football level, the idea of Hugo coming in as a number two at Nice. But he’s a kid from the region, he loves the club. It’s a project that could correspond him with the right timing. We have him in a corner of our head.”
