The Chronicle has a new transfer rumor out that suggests that, fresh on the heels of their £114m signing of Elliot Anderson, Manchester City are entering the race for Newcastle midfielder Sandro Tonali, despite Tottenham Hotspur’s long term interest in the player and £80m rejected bid.
There isn’t a whole lot of info here, just a two sentence report citing sources “close to Tonali’s management team,” followed by 600 words of context padding.
Manchester City have joined the battle to sign Sandro Tonali
with Enzo Maresca eager to hit the ground running as new boss.
The FA Cup and Carabao Cup winners have retained an interest in the Toon midfielder, with sources close to Tonali’s management team describing Man City as genuine candidates to lure him from Tyneside. Spurs had an £80million bid rejected by Newcastle this month with the Magpies wanting a fee closer to £100m for his services.
Notably there isn’t anything specific in here — how much City are willing to bid, whether Newcastle would be more amenable to a City approach for Tonali, etc. It’s light on details but does mention a source very well connected to Tonali. It also suggests City are not done with their summer spending despite spending a six figure amount on Anderson last week. It also suggests the possibility that Tonali’s interest in leaving Newcastle for Spurs is softer than a down pillow, and that he’d rather go to a mega-rich club like City than the club that finished 17th twice in two seasons.
This could be a number of things. It could be factual if taken at face value, signaling that Spurs might be forced to pivot to different targets. It might be Newcastle signalling that Spurs need to get off their asses and make a respectable bid for Tonali so they can close the deal, and using potential interest from City as a stalking horse. It could be completely fake. We don’t know, and there’s not enough info to make a firm conclusion.
In my opinion, I think Tonali would probably prefer to go to City than to Spurs, if the club puts a good bid in that’s a little closer to Newcastle’s £100m valuation of the player. That’s more or less Occam’s Razor at work — it takes a rare top level player to prefer to move to the rebuilding team than the one that challenges for Premier League titles every season. And I could be very wrong here! But I am starting to think that the combination of big clubs vying for Tonali’s signature and the player hoping to cash in for a big summer move at a different club will probably result in Spurs missing out. As I’ve said before, I’m actually okay with that option, as there are better fits for Spurs’ needs in the midfield market that would cost that price or less. But it would be a pretty significant blow for Tottenham’s hopes for a “big swing” in the midfield market this summer.
