It\u2019s done. Well, it\u2019s been done for a while but now it\u2019s official. Tottenham Hotspur formally announced the departure of defender Luka Vuskovic to Brighton & Hove Albion. Spurs will receive a guaranteed \u00a348m in fees, and the contract includes a 20% sell-on whenever Brighton decide to sell Vuskovic in the future (EDIT: plus the option to match and supersede any potential offer).<\/p>\n
The move comes before the Croatian wunderkind even made an official first team appearance with Spurs. Tottenham agreed to purchasehe Vuskovic from his boyhood club Hajkuk Split when he was 15, but weren\u2019t able to formally sign him until he turned 18. In the meantime, Vuskovic spent his time eternally on loan \u2014 first at Radomiak Radom in Poland, then a stint at Westerlo in Belgium before his impressive loan with Hamburg in the Bundesliga last season. That Hamburg season was amazing \u2014 he was named to the Bundesliga team of the season and by season\u2019s end he had cemented his status as one of the most talented young players in Europe.<\/p>\n
However, he still seemed seemingly stuck as a 4th or 5th choice CB at Tottenham Hotspur, and there were questions as to whether his skill set would transfer to Roberto De Zerbi\u2019s new tactics at Spurs. Vuskovic is excellent in the air and positionally solid, but his speed is something of a concern in the fast-paced Premier League. Named to Croatia\u2019s World Cup squad, Vuskovic and his agents started making noise this summer about wanting to leave the club, eventually leading to where we are now.<\/p>\n
\u00a350m+ for a 19-year-old defender who hasn\u2019t played in the Premier League yet is very good money, and Tottenham made the decision to cash in on his potential rather than keep a potentially unhappy future star on the bench. Vuskovic clearly just wanted to play ball, and he\u2019ll have a much better chance of getting regular playing time at Brighton (replacing Jan Paul van Hecke, now at Spurs) than if he stayed in north London. I would\u2019ve wished for a buy-back clause in the deal, but getting 20% of any future sale is a nice cherry on top of the cake.<\/p>\n
I wish I could\u2019ve seen Luka play for us at least once, but that\u2019s not to be. Tottenham made a business decision with Vuskovic, and considering the outlay they\u2019ve already spent on transfers this summer, it\u2019s not a dumb move from a business perspective. But we\u2019ll always be wondering what might have happened if we had stuck to our guns.<\/p>\n
Too late \u2014 now we will see just how close Vuskovic gets to fulfilling his incredible promise. Good luck, Luka. Don\u2019t score against us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s done. Well, it\u2019s been done for a while but now it\u2019s official. Tottenham Hotspur formally announced the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":762475,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[99,55348],"class_list":["post-762474","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-sports","tag-tottenham-transfer-news-rumors"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/762474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=762474"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/762474\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/762475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=762474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=762474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=762474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}