Halilovic's family blocks transfer to Tottenham Hotspur again

According to reports in Croatia, the transfer of Dinamo Zagreb wunderkind Alen Halilovic to Tottenham Hotspur has been, once again, blocked by the players family. In a lengthy piece, Sportske Novosti writer Alen Lesicki lays out the logic behind the families decision to prevent their child from moving to North London for a second time. Essentially, Alen's father Saed, who happens to be a coach at Dinamo, will not budge on his demands. The two sides have agreed to take a time out and resume talks next week.

Tottenham Hotspur's problem is usually getting the other club to agree to a fee for a player, in this instance Tottenham paid the players release clause of €15 million. This time, the problem is Saed. He does not want his son playing in the Tottenham Hotspur reserves or being loaned back to Dinamo for the remainder of the year. Obviously, given the talent at Spurs there's no guarantee that Halilovic would come anywhere close to cracking the first team this year and that seems to be exactly what Saed wants.

Saed believes that his son has stagnated under the coaching of Krunoslav Jurcic and thus a return to Dinamo is out of the question. That, however, would also seem to make staying at Dinamo out of the question. Jurcic has, apparently, stated, that Halilovic will not be near the first-team this year and is more likely to play youth and reserve games. A situation which the player's father will not abide.

This whole transfer is the stupidest most screwed up thing ever. If Halilovic's dad doesn't want his son loaned back to Dinamo, then don't loan him back there. Loan him somewhere else. I hear Swindon is nice this time of year. In all seriousness though, he needs to somewhere we he can get first team matches and develop as a footballer. It doesn't seem like Zagreb are willing to develop him any further and I think it's naive to think that he would break into Tottenham's first team. If Spurs want this deal to happen they need to find another top division club willing to take Halilovic and play him all season.