Tottenham Hotspur managing director Fabio Paratici defends club’s transfer business after frustrating January window
As per the Evening Standard, Tottenham Hotspur’s Managing Director of Football, Fabio Paratici, has defended the club’s transfer business in the winter transfer window despite missing out on key targets.
The Italian was appointed by Spurs at the beginning of the season, responsible for managing and developing the club’s sporting operations as they looked to kickstart a new era of pulling in some of the world’s best players to north London.
After spending almost the entire January window without any transfer activity, Paratici managed to raid his former club Juventus to complete the double signing of Dejan Kulusevski and Rodrigo Bentancur on deadline day, claiming they were the “right players in the right positions”.
“We were looking for specific positions. I think we found the right players in the right positions. Players like Bentancur and Kulusevski are young but they have a lot of experience because Bentancur plays for five years at Juventus, almost 200 games and Kulusevksi almost 100.”
Kulusevski joins the club on an 18-month loan deal, while Bentancur completed a permanent move to Spurs on deadline day. Fans can hope to see their new players make their debuts for the club this weekend in the FA Cup against Brighton and Hove Albion.
Paratici criticised
Paratici defended his transfer business in January, saying that he did what was possible in the given time, with the opportunities he had. This comes after recent criticism about his work.
“It’s just one month, not three months like in the summer. A lot of teams, a lot of clubs don’t want to move some players. It’s a market about opportunities.”
All in all, a fair assessment of the January transfer window business for Spurs can be regarded as frustrating, despite the two signings from Serie A. Previous attempts at landing transfer targets failed, and it forced Paratici to head to his former employers to get players to keep Conte satisfied.
The club did well in letting a number of players leave last month as Conte deemed them surplus to requirements, but lost out to Barcelona and Liverpool as they signed Spurs’ major transfer targets in Adama Traore and Luis Diaz respectively. This left many fans disappointed by the club’s efforts in signing new faces- at least until the last day of the window.
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Kulusevski and Bentancur are no doubt wonderful talents, but question marks will be raised as to how they get along and adapt to the English game. The PL and Serie A are two different leagues, after all.
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Spurs are yet to win a major trophy since 2008 and we have rarely ever looked like title contenders. The one time we did, Leicester City pipped us to the crown under Claudio Ranieri. Our exploits in the UEFA Champions League have been underwhelming as well, with the final in the 2019 edition being a remarkably glaring high-point in an otherwise dim decade of Spurs’ participation in Europe.
In such a situation, fans have to be realistic. The job of rebuilding a team to make them genuine contenders for some of the biggest trophies isn’t easy, and it sure can’t be done in just one window. Conte has clearly made his mark on the club in January, and it’s a considerable step taken in what is hopefully the right direction for us.
