Tottenham’s Kai Havertz mistake laid bare by £70 Barcelona links

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Kai Havertz looks increasingly like the dream signing for Premier League strugglers Spurs – but is the Bayer Leverkusen starlet heading to Barcelona?

Forget the comparisons with Mesut Ozil and Michael Ballack, Kai Havertz deserves to stand alone in his own right not as the ‘new this or that’ but as arguably the most exciting young playmaker in European football today.

Not that Tottenham Hotspur need reminding about the abilities of a 20-year-old who combines the subtlety and ethereal grace of Ozil with the goalscoring blunderbuss of Ballack.

It is two years now since Sky first broke the news that Spurs were looking to bring a then-18-year-old Havertz to North London. At the time, Mauricio Pochettino’s side were scouring the market for the next generation of superstars and the Bayer Leverkusen wonderkid, along with Ross Barkley, Donny Van de Beek and Justin Kluivert, was high on their radar.

In the autumn of 2017, Havertz was just starting to make a name for himself in Germany, having become Leverkusen’s youngest ever Bundesliga goalscorer at the age of just 17. And, crucially, he was still well within Tottenham’s reach.

Flash forward two years, however, and not much has changed at Tottenham – at least not behind the scenes. Daniel Levy still rules with an iron fist and those purse-strings drawn, much to the chagrin of Spurs supporters and, at times, Pochettino himself.

Havertz, in the meantime, has gone from precocious teen to the doorstep of super-stardom. A tally of 20 goals from central midfield last season has caught the eye of, amongst others, Barcelona with ESPN reporting that the now-seven time Germany international has a price tag of £70 million on his head.

In a time where Tottenham are crying out for a scheming number 10 capable of replacing the soon out-of-contract Christian Eriksen not just now but for the next five or six seasons, Havertz looks increasingly like the type of signing Pochettino needs as the manager looks to mould a new era from a tired old regime. And it’s worth mentioning that the Aachen-born youngster is surely entering his final few months as a Leverkusen player.

But it feels now, with his price tag skyrocketing and the Catalan kings running the rule over a new fresh-faced prince, that Havertz is more out of Tottenham’s reach than ever before.