Romano: Gollini to Tottenham imminent

If Fabrizio Romano is correct, Tottenham Hotspur are one the verge of announcing their first signing of the summer 2021 transfer window. Confirming reports that we wrote on earlier in the day, Romano is reporting that Spurs have an agreement for a one season loan for Atalanta goalkeeper Pierluigi Gollini, with an extension option and the possibility of eventually making it permanent.

Gollini, 26, is considered an excellent young(ish) keeper with Premier League experience: he came up through Manchester United’s academy and also has a two year stint as a keeper at Aston Villa. And in fact, that United tenure could be even more important, as discovered by our Friends of the Blog at the Tottenham podcast The Extra Inch — while Transfermarkt and Wikipedia both state that he was only at United for two years (from 2012-14), there are photos in the Getty database that clearly show Gollini at United in 2011. If he was there an extra year, that would make him homegrown for the purpose of Premier League and European competition purposes.

We don’t know for SURE for sure that he’s considered homegrown, but that’s really the only way that this move would make sense, unless Spurs are planning on selling Hugo Lloris (or Joe Hart) this summer with one year to go on his current contract.

Gollini is a pretty good keeper, and if Hugo’s sticking around he’ll make an excellent backup, or at least a better one than Hart. It’s not the flashiest of signings, but Gollini on loan is a better #2 keeper and potentially a future #1. Now bring Cristian Romero along with you, Pierluigi!

Edit: Apparently Gollini is also a rapper. Well, now I think we HAVE to sign this guy, we haven’t had a rapper on the team since Dempsey!