Toby Alderweireld set to stay at Tottenham as release clause expires

This summer’s transfer window has been a wild one. Plenty of players have moved to new clubs, transfer sagas are ongoing (Hi Neymar!), and Spurs have been a big player during it. Having purchased Tanguy Ndombele for a club record fee and selling Kieran Trippier to Atletico Madrid, the club aren’t remotely close to being done with business with just a couple of weeks left in the transfer window.

The most surprising development of the summer for the club is that Toby Alderweireld looks to be stay put as nobody has opted to activate his £25m release clause. That clause expired at 5PM UK time, which means if he’s leaving, it will now be on Tottenham’s terms.

Spurs opted to exercise the one year option on Toby’s contract back in January, knowing full well that by doing so, the release clause went into effect. There has been little to no movement for the Belgian International, with AS Roma being the only club even remotely interested in his services. Franco Baldini, who once worked for Tottenham Hotspur as the official “Joe Lewis AmEx Card Carrier” executive back in the 2013 summer window, attempted to negotiate a deal with Spurs for less than the clause. This led to rumors that Spurs were also interested in 20 year old attacker Nicolò Zaniolo, with Baldini dangling him in front of Levy to sweeten the pot.

A report broke yesterday that Daniel Levy would increase the valuation of the defender to £40m once the clause expired. Imagine being Ed Woodward, chasing Harry Maguire and deciding £100m is too much when you could have purchased Toby for £25m....only for the clause to expire and now you have to deal with Levy directly.

To Toby’s credit, he has come out this week and said he plans to stay at the club now that it’s clear nobody was in the market for him. It has to be a bit of a surprise to everyone, including him and his agent, that it’s gone down like this. There’s no word on if this means the club would be open to extending him or if he’ll leave on a free transfer next summer when he’s out of contract. That saga will undoubtedly continue into the season once the window slams shut.

For now, the man wearing #4 is going to be in the back line for the upcoming season, giving Spurs a chance to scout further for a potential replacement.