We’ve been complaining about the lack of serious transfer rumors, but yesterday fresh reports emerged that Tottenham Hotspur had a player-plus-cash proposal for midfielder Jacob Ramsey beaten back by Aston Villa a few weeks ago. Both Dan Kilpatrick in the Standard and Alasdair Gold in Football.London now write today that Spurs are considering a fresh approach for the 23-year old midfielder as they look to add homegrown midfield talent to their roster.
Both report that Spurs approached Villa about Ramsey a few weeks ago when Villa were reportedly still considering their financial options while under a PSR crunch. One apparently mooted proposal involved a bid — since £20m + Giovani Lo Celso, but Villa rejected the proposal as they were not interested in selling Ramsey who has three years left on his Villa contract. Villa manager Unai Emery calling him “a big, big player” and important to Villa’s future. Also since Villa are playing in the Champions League next season and Tottenham are not, it’s also not clear whether Ramsey would be at all interested in this move.
The interest in Ramsey is supposedly driven by Tottenham’s recruitment director Johan Lange, who worked at Villa before taking the Spurs job. Ramsey is considered an exciting young English player with a bright future and who can play across the midfield line, but he’s coming off of an injury-plagued season where he only played 853 league minutes. Ramsey was a key player for Villa in the previous two seasons, scoring six goals in 2021-22 and 2022-23, and adding seven assists in the latter season while playing primarily on the wing.
According to Gold, Spurs’ approach for Ramsey was likely driven not just by Lange’s admiration for the player but by the assumption that Villa would need to sell players in order to comply with the Premier League’s PSR financial regulations. Villa (and Chelsea) appear to be attempting other moves involving youth players or Douglas Luiz to Juventus in order to get around those rules and exploit some loopholes in the system.
I’m torn on Spurs’ interest in Ramsey. Tottenham are absolutely in the market for another central midfielder and are clearly looking to bolster their homegrown ranks so they can maximize their squad in the Europa League last season, but Villa are said to value Ramsey at £40m-50m and that feels like money that could be spent more wisely. It’s never a bad idea to look at players who are both young and English — it’s worked well for Spurs in the past. But Tottenham need upgrades in those areas, not squad players, and I’m not certain whether Ramsey’s promise is enough to make him a priority at this time.