Telegraph: Spurs pushing for Traore loan-to-buy deal

If there’s one particular Tottenham Hotspur transfer rumor that’s generating the most smoke right now, it’s Adama Traore. There have been enough credible rumors surrounding Spurs’ interest in bringing the Spanish dribble monster to White Hart Lane that it’d be pretty foolish to ignore them now.

The latest comes from our old friend Matt Law in the Telegraph (£), who writes that Spurs are working on convincing Wolves that they really should accept a loan for Adama for the rest of the season with an obligation to purchase this summer.

If that sounds like a familiar Tottenham transfer position, well — it is. Spurs’ Managing Director of Football Fabio Paratici has been using this Rent-A-Footballer method on a number of occasions, including this summer’s transfer deals for Pierluigi Gollini and Cuti Romero. It begs the question though — why?

One possible answer could be due to money, but not in the way you might think. The financial numbers recently released by the club during the COVID year made it clear that while Spurs were absolutely hurt by a season with no match revenue, they were able to come out of that awful situation with a lot less damage relative to other Premier League clubs. Spurs have been signalling that they have money to spend for months now.

But what they might not have is LIQUIDITY. In short, it’s possible that Spurs are a rich club that is temporarily cash poor due to COVID, and that these loan-to-buy deals are an attempt to kick the financial can down the road a bit until the stadium cash machine can go brrrrrrrrr (or until they can offload a few players of their own).

Another possibility could be as simple as that this is just the way Fabio Paratici likes to do things. I haven’t bothered to dig into how he structured transfers while he was at Juventus, but if there’s a pattern there it might explain why he seems to be focused on delayed financial deals.

Either way, the loan-to-buy seems to be the way Spurs want to approach the Adama deal for now. The biggest question is to whether Wolves will go for it. That jury appears to be out — Law suggests that Wolves may be stuck between a rock and a hard place with Traore entering the last year of his contract in June. If they wait, Traore’s value could drop ahead of a summer move, but they may continue to push for a full transfer with amortization that’s more favorable to Spurs.

This one isn’t quite in the home stretch but it looks like it’s getting there. Get the celebratory baby oil on standby.