:format(webp)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/30920629/175935545.0.jpg)
We've discussed Tottenham Hotspur Director of Football Franco Baldini's future with the club on several occasions, but now, the Mirror is reporting that Baldini could depart White Hart Lane so that the club can focus on "home-based players". At first blush, this seems like some sort of weird all-English-player-sign-James-Milner sort of philosophy, but surprisingly, it's a bit more reasonable than that. The club merely want to focus on players that have Premier League experience.
Given than none of the players Tottenham Hotspur signed this summer had experience in the Premier League, an adjustment period was expected. Most of us didn't anticipate that the adjustment period would last all season. In order to combat that, chairman Daniel Levy, and presumably Tim Sherwood, want to focus on attempting to sign the likes of Christian Benteke, Loic Remy, and Romelu Lukaku, and Luke Shaw, all of which have Premier League experience.
There's nothing wrong, in my mind, to wanting to find players that are experienced in your league. The English Premier League is, apparently, a difficult league to adjust to and signing guys that are ready to play in it right away would certainly be good. However, if that's the club's new transfer policy, then we're going to miss out on a lot of talented players from the continent.
Erik Lamela is seen as the prime example of why talented players in other leagues don't translate to England or at least not to the colossal dumpster fire that is the 2013-14 Tottenham Hotspur season. However, a player like Lamela is available to Spurs while he's in another division. If Spurs wait until a player comes to England and then turns into Eden Hazard, they're going to be wasting a lot of time and money. Lots of players have come to Spurs and made an impact without ever having played in the Premier League. Christian Eriksen is a fine example. As are Dimitar Berbatov, Gareth Bale (who did take a little time to get going), Hugo Lloris, Jan Vertonghen, Sandro, and Rafael van der Vaart.
If Tottenham are looking for a quick fix or at least an easier beginning to the season, then buying some home-based players probably isn't a bad idea. If they club makes that their long-term transfer policy, then it may wind up being very costly and very limiting.
