Fabio Paratici is planning a raid of Serie A champions Inter Milan, with the Tottenham Hotspur chief hoping to bring in Stefan de Vrij and Marcelo Brozovic for a combined £40 million, as reported by Inter Live.
You will probably have heard by now that Inter are spending the summer searching for the odd loose penny down the back of the San Siro sofa.
Despite lifting their first league title since the days of Wesley Sneijder, Samuel Eto’o and Diego Milito in May, the Nerazzuri appear to have replaced Barcelona as Europe’s most cash-strapped side.
Talismanic manager Antonio Conte walked away amid fears that Inter’s Chinese owners could sell the silver and break up his title-winning squad, with the likes of Lautaro Martinez, Romelu Lukaku and Alessandro Bastoni tipped to depart.
But while Inter are not exactly in a favourable position with two-and-a-half months of the transfer window remaining, it remains to be seen exactly how desperate they really are.
How the 2010 European champions respond to a combined £40 million bid for De Vrij and Brozovic should answer that question.
Will Paratici bring two Inter Milan stars to Tottenham?
According to Inter Live, Tottenham’s newly appointed sporting director is looking to raid the Scudetto holders in order to bring a Dutch centre-back and a Croatian conductor to North London.
The commanding, classy De Vrij, arguably the finest central defender in Italian football these days, would account for less than half of that £40 million.
The remaining £21 million would be spent on Brozovic, the deep-lying midfield general who blossomed in something of a Pirlo-esque play-making role under Conte in Milan.
“He can become world class,” Conte once said of the Zagreb-born orchestrator.
“Brozo has different traits (to Pirlo). I want him to become a world-class player.”
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