Championship trio Barnsley, Reading and Brighton & Hove Albion were reportedly keen to borrow the Spurs midfielder.
Tottenham Hotspur turned down offers from Barnsley, Reading and Brighton & Hove Albion, to take midfielder Harry Winks on loan, a report in the Independent claims.
Winks, 20, has risen through the ranks at Hotspur Way and could make his long-awaited first start for the club he supported as a boy in Wednesday’s EFL Cup tie against Gillingham.
Unlike fellow Spurs academy products Harry Kane, Tom Carroll and Ryan Mason (now Hull), Winks has never been loaned out, and there is a reason for that according to the Independent.
It is alleged the decision to keep Winks on board was Mauricio Pochettino’s, with the Argentine reluctant to see those he holds in high regard coached by anyone else – a policy he brought with him from Southampton.
The report adds that, if after that, a player is deemed not good enough to play in the first team, only then will Pochettino allow him to leave.
The head coach’s opinion of Winks is perhaps best demonstrated by Spurs’ decision to hand the England Under-20 international a new five-year contract last week, having allowed Mason to leave during the summer transfer window.
All three reported suitors were in the market for central midfielders at some stage during the last three months, with Barnsley landing both George Moncur and Sam Morsy, while Brighton acquired key Reading playmaker Oliver Norwood.
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