Transfer deadline day is always largely anticipated by pundits, football fans and players alike, albeit at the expense of the well-being of the clubs involved. It’s a mad rush, with the majority of teams scrambling to purchase their desired targets at the lowest price possible. Interestingly, there have been cases of clubs hijacking incoming transfers from their counterparts in extraordinary fashion, much to the dismay of the first party in the picture.
And so a case plodding along those lines unravelled on August 31, 2016, involving Everton, Tottenham Hotspur and French international Moussa Sissoko. The Merseyside club had initially agreed a fee reported to be £30 million for the 27-year-old, only for Tottenham to step in and match their valuation. Given Sissoko’s desire to play for a top club in the Champions League, as expressed in an interview before the Euros, the decision was only going to swing one way.
Now Sissoko had enjoyed a good tournament on home soil and was arguably France’s best player on the pitch in their 1-0 defeat to Portugal in the final. Yet if one needed a barometer to ascertain which club came off the better in this deal, all signs would point towards Sissoko’s former employers. Despite his heroics for his country, Sissoko had become largely unpopular with the Newcastle faithful given his inability to exert any degree of influence in games that were vital to their season. His statistics are massively underwhelming too. One goal and seven assists in 37 league appearances is embarrassing for a player who claims he is good enough to play in Europe’s premier club competition. A lack of urgency, committment and desire coupled with a cocky attitude rendered him a dead man walking in Tyneside and for those reasons put together in a bunch, Newcastle will be delighted to see the last of him.
For a player who came across as a major disappointment to a relegated club, a £30 million price tag appears far too steep for him. This deal left the masses in disbelief and angered a section of Tottenham fans, not just because of the transfer itself but the club’s inability to add some muscle to a promising squad. With Ryan Mason and Nacer Chadli sent to Hull City and West Bromwich Albion respectively and Nabil Bentaleb loaned out to Schalke 04, many view the purchase of Sissoko as a panic buy, given the paucity of options that emerged for Tottenham in midfield. For all the qualities he was lauded for before moving to England, Sissoko has done precious little to earn this move and ought to consider himself fortunate to get a break like this.
His tenacious displays for France provide some respite to the Tottenham faithful. Sissoko’s energetic runs through midfield were a recurring theme in the Euros and some of his dribbling skills were up for the French supporters to see. A few good performances in a tournament may not mask the murkier truth, spanning forty-two months but in this day and age, valuations are sky high and any positives whatsoever create a fair deal of goodwill for the player. Such was his stock post the tournament that Newcastle slapped a £35 million price tag on the Frenchman. However, in the scheme of things, they will not be disappointed to take a 14% loss on the assigned value, given the reluctancy of interested clubs to meet that fee.
Incidentally, the only other player who cost Tottenham £30 million was Erik Lamela, thereby rendering Sissoko the joint most expensive signing in their history. Panic-buy or not, there is nobody in the league that has to prove himself more than the Frenchman this season.
