After West Ham’s struggle with similar terms, were Spurs lucky to see Andre Gomes deal collapse?

Follow us on Google Discover

Tottenham Hotspur reportedly missed out on a deadline day deal for Andre Gomes.

Tottenham Hotspur may have snapped up two new signings on deadline day, but they also missed out on a third in Barcelona midfielder Andre Gomes.

Right back Serge Aurier and striker Fernando Llorente arrived from Paris Saint-Germain and Swansea City respectively, taking Mauricio Pochettino’s summer intake to five new signings after the additions of Paulo Gazzaniga, Juan Foyth, Davinson Sanchez.

However, Tottenham did also attempt to bring in a new central midfielder, though their deal for Andre Gomes fell through, after Barcelona decided they couldn’t let him go after all, having failed to bring in a replacement.

The Portugal international, 24, has failed to live up to his billing since joining Barcelona from Valencia last summer, and Tottenham had seemingly lined him up for a move to North London to try and get his career back on track – but the terms of the deal were far from perfect.

The Daily Mail claimed on deadline day (17:00) that Gomes would have been joining on loan, but if he played 60% of Tottenham’s games, then they would be forced to pay a huge £40million fee to sign him on a permanent basis.

Such terms are similar to West Ham’s deal for Simone Zaza in 2016, and it got to the point where the Hammers had to leave Zaza out of their side, despite their need for attacking players, to prevent him from reaching the required number of games to trigger a permanent deal, given that they realised he wasn’t good enough.

Simone Zaza

A move like that doesn’t seem like something Daniel Levy would be overly keen on; Tottenham may have soured on Gomes given his lack of confidence and playing time at Barcelona, but unforeseen circumstances can come into play over the course of a season.

An injury or suspension crisis could have forced Spurs to use Gomes even if they didn’t feel he was worthy of a £40million fee, and if they had left him out to prevent him from reaching the required games played, they would still have been paying considerable wages for a Barcelona and Portugal ace.

West Ham had problems with Zaza in a similar deal, and Spurs may in fact have been lucky to have avoided terms where they would have lost a certain level of control over Gomes, essentially putting themselves on the hook for a £40million transfer without fully knowing just how good Gomes would be in the Premier Leaguge.