“There were talks” – Insistence Tottenham Hotspur attempt to sign player isn’t imagination

The tactics Barcelona have used to try and force Ousmane Dembele to either leave or renew have been poor, to say the least.

However, it’s also fair to consider that the Frenchman and his agent were asking for vastly unreasonable sums of money and clearly felt no loyalty to the club.

On deadline day, Tottenham Hotspur were one of a few clubs linked with a late move for the attacker, with the idea being that Spurs would take him on loan until the end of the season, with Barcelona not wanting him around.

At that point, the stance, seemingly coming from Barcelona president Joan Laporta and straight through the Catalan media, was that Dembele would spend the rest of the season ostracised if he didn’t move to Tottenham or elsewhere.

However, the player and his agent probably knew otherwise, given these threats have been made repeatedly before, always very publicly, and never actually carried out.

Therefore, despite Saturday’s edition of Sport insisting “there were talks” with Tottenham at the end of the window, there was no stick incentive for Dembele to leave.

And now, to the surprise of nobody, it’s stated Barcelona have told Xavi Hernandez he can pick Dembele should he want to.