Spurs reportedly meet with Schalke in London to finalize Lewis Holtby deal

Lewis Holtby may be coming to Tottenham Hotspur this week, instead of this summer. According to Bild, Schalke sporting director Horst Heldt is in London to meet with Spurs about selling Holtby now instead of letting him leave for White Hart Lane on a free transfer after the season.

If various reports are to be believed, Schalke are holding out for as much as £2 million, while Spurs have yet to bid £1 million. While unconfirmed, those numbers are believable, as is this report that Heldt is in London, but if they were incorrect nobody would be floored.

Getting Holtby now could be what puts Tottenham into the Champions League. They are already in fourth place, a position they could hold without Holtby, but their grip on fourth is tenuous at best right now.

Meanwhile, Spurs are still struggling to get adequate play from their attacking midfielder. Clint Dempsey had a rough go of it to start and while he has improved, he hasn't been good. He scored in each of his last two matches, but also missed sitters in each and gave the ball away too much. But Dempsey's play was still better than Gylfi Sigurdsson's against Leeds and at the beginning of the season, casting doubt upon a decent run of form when he played well coming off the bench for six weeks in December and January.

Even if Holtby has a bit of a rough transition to Spurs and the Premier League, he will be an improvement on Dempsey and Sigurdsson. That improvement could be what fires Tottenham to the Champions League.