Aston Villa managed to get a deal over the line for Chelsea defender Axel Disasi in the final hours of the January transfer window - but Fabrizio Romano has stated that Tottenham Hotspur came close to ousting the Villans, with the Blues only wanting to sell to Ange Postecoglou's side.
Disasi's lack of minutes at Chelsea this season - despite being labelled as the club's 'leader' in the past by journalist Nizaar Kinsella - made him the ideal target for Premier League clubs who were in desperate need of centre-back recruitments. Villa, having sold Diego Carlos and then seeing Tyrone Mings ruled out for the rest of the season with an ACL injury, were in dire need of someone to come into their ranks - whilst Tottenham have suffered further with Cristian Romero, Micky van de Ven and Radu Dragusin all on the sidelines.
Romano: Chelsea Only Wanted Disasi 'to Join Tottenham'
Tottenham Hotspur missed out on Axel Disasi in their defensive ranks
As a result, the duo went head-to-head to secure Disasi's signing. The Frenchman has only played in six Premier League games under Enzo Maresca this season and that forced him out of the club on loan - though it could have been much different.
And Romano has stated on his YouTube channel that Chelsea didn't want to do a deal with Villa, instead wanting to send him to Tottenham - but the player's mind was made up and a deal was agreed late on. He said on Monday evening:
"This is actually another crazy story of this deadline day, because Tottenham agreed the fee with Chelsea for a loan fee - a straight loan.
"But at the end of the day, Chelsea only wanted to give the player to Tottenham, not to Aston Villa. The problem is that last week, in an exclusive story, Axel Disasi told Aston Villa that he was only going to join them - not to Wolves, not to Tottenham, not to Italian clubs.
"He wanted to go to Aston Villa, playing Champions League football, playing for Unai Emery.
"The problem was that there was no intention for Chelsea to accept until tonight [Monday], when Chelsea said yes to this opportunity. The same loan fees as Tottenham, something around £5million to £5.5million pounds with a salary covered and no buy option."
Statistics courtesy of WhoScored. Correct as of 04-02-25.