The 2025/26 campaign is drawing closer, and Tottenham Hotspur still need to make some signings if Thomas Frank is to challenge among the big hitters on Premier League and Champions League fronts.
There are multiple avenues that Spurs could head down over the coming weeks, but one route we know will not be followed is toward the City Ground for Nottingham Forest playmaker Morgan Gibbs-White, who has signed a new contract in spite of Tottenham activating his £60m release clause earlier this month.
Tottenham have played out two pre-season draws this month, against third-tier side Wycombe Wanderers and Luton Town, who have suffered back-to-back relegations over the past two seasons and indeed now languish in League One.
Why Spurs wanted Morgan Gibbs-White
James Maddison’s two terms with Tottenham have been laced with damaging setbacks, injured badly on several occasions and struggling for fluency at times. However, he has been prolific when playing and has that X-factor about him.
He’s been sidelined since before the end of last season, and Dejan Kulusevski underwent surgery on a patella injury in May that will keep him absent into the 2025/26 campaign.
Gibbs-White, 25, would have been perfect. Industrious and versatile, the England international is a fierce tackler and an intelligent passer, having also chipped with seven goals and eight assists in the league, with his efforts leading The Athletic’s Paul Taylor to say he was “among the most in-form, best performing players in the Premier League” last year.
However, he will ply his trade for the Tricky Trees once again next season, a cruel blow when a deal seemed so close only weeks ago for the Lilywhites.
Tottenham need an alternative, but that doesn’t strictly mean that Frank will sign a player of strict positional similarities to Gibbs-White.
Instead, he might pursue a record-breaking deal for one of Europe’s prized forwards.
Spurs in talks for bigger deal than Gibbs-White
Earlier in July, Iberian newspapers published a report that revealed Spurs’ interest in Real Madrid forward Rodrygo, who looks likely to leave the Spanish capital this summer after falling down the pecking order, Xabi Alonso currently establishing his Los Blancos vision.
The 24-year-old, nonetheless, would cost a pretty penny, having been priced at £87m. Thus, he would break Spurs’ transfer record, were he to join the project this summer.
And now, Spanish reporter Ramon Alvarez has revealed that the London club have opened talks for the versatile forward, suggesting that things could start ramping up in the coming days and weeks.
Further Spanish sources have confirmed interest from Arsenal and Liverpool, with the latter understood to be preparing a formal bid as Luiz Diaz completes a transfer to Bayern Munich, so this is hardly going to be an easy one to pull off.
Why Spurs want to sign Rodrygo
Why do Tottenham want to sign Rodrygo? Well, Jude Bellingham thinks he’s “probably the most talented and the most gifted player” at Real Madrid, and that makes a comment on his potential to become a superstar in the Premier League.
Even though the Brazil international left something to be desired with his performances last season, he still chalked up 14 goals and 11 assists across all competitions, scarcely playing on his preferred left side, where his ball-striking ability is best served.
The right-footer actually recorded 12 goal involvements from as many matches as a left-sided forward across all competitions last season, though this amounted to just 22% of his total action across the year.
Gibbs-White is a fine player, to be sure, but he’s not Rodrygo, who joined Real Madrid from Santos as an 18-year-old. It was 2019, and he arrived for a £39.5m fee.
Since that point, he’s become a mainstay at the world’s (probably) biggest football club, gluttonous with trophy-winning success and an incredibly talented and hard-working winger, willing to play across a range of positions so to best serve the team.
He even won 56% of his ground duels in La Liga last season, as per Sofascore, denoting a crispness in combative situations which will prove crucial for Frank’s Tottenham.
Frank will demand fluent, careful football that marries the exciting with the grounded. Rodrygo will aid this and then some, ranked among the top 6% of attacking midfielders and wingers in La Liga last season for pass completion, the top 13% for shot-creating actions and the top 11% for progressive carries per 90, as per FBref.
Shot-creating actions are pieces of play that lead to a shot. These include moments such as a pass, take-on or foul being drawn.
He’s the complete package, all right, having shown himself to have a variety of tools across different phases of play. It’s no wonder Luka Modric once labelled his Real teammate a “world-class superstar”.
Moreover, he’s a big-game player, whereas Gibbs-White’s potential on the very biggest stage has yet to be seen with regularity.
Gibbs-White would provide Frank’s system with creativity from the nucleus of the pitch, but Rodrygo, positionally flexible, would bring his own brand of offensive expertise, surely good enough to make the club forget about their Forest target.
In 2022/23, indeed, a young Rodrygo was among the most prolific right wingers across Europe’s top-five leagues, behind only Lionel Messi and Mohamed Salah. Not bad, that.
Mohamed Salah
51
30
16
46
Lionel Messi
41
21
20
41
Rodrygo
55
19
11
30
Riyad Mahrez
47
15
13
28
Bukayo Saka
48
15
12
27
Given that Rodrygo pines for a starting role on the alternate flank, with recent evidence suggesting that is his most fruitful position, it’s clear that Tottenham could hit the jackpot by making this signing.
And once the likes of Maddison and Kulusevski are fit and firing on all cylinders again, we could have an incredible team of depth and dynamism, just waiting to pounce on the season’s opportunities and add to that Europa League title, which might be the harbinger of an era of sustained success down N17.
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