Tottenham Hotspur could lose one of their best players after it emerged that Barcelona have picked him out as a dark horse candidate to improve their defensive ranks.
Romero set to stay as Spurs captain after social media outburst
Tottenham head coach Thomas Frank has confirmed Cristian Romero remains captain and has not been fined after his explosive social-media post.
Romero apologised to Spurs fans in an Instagram post after Wednesday’s 3-2 loss at Bournemouth and appeared to take aim at key figures at the club when he said “at times like this, it should be other people coming out to speak, but they don’t”.
World Cup-winner Romero went on to state “they only show up when things are going well” and “we will keep facing up to it and trying to turn the situation around”.
However, the 27-year-old will not face any further disciplinary measure for his comments which sparked debate over the target of Romero’s frustration given Daniel Levy left his role in September and chief executive Vinai Venkatesham was only appointed in April.
The Argentina international has been linked with a move to Real Madrid in recent transfer windows, but it is now his centre-back partner who could be heading to one of Spain’s biggest clubs.
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Indeed, according to a report from Sport, Barcelona are keen to strengthen at centre-back, and while they also hold an interest in Nico Schlotterbeck, Alessandro Bastoni and Marc Guéhi, Tottenham star van de Ven has emerged as the ‘secret’ option on their list.
The report claims that despite being one of Tottenham’s ‘best players’ he ‘desperately’ wants to leave North London and would be ‘delighted’ to play for Barca.
And there’s no question the speedy Dutchman is one of Frank’s top performers, starting all but one Premier League game this term, scoring three times and making more interceptions than all but two players in Tottenham’s ranks.
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Spurs are likely to put up a fight to keep the 24 year-old, given that Radu Dragusin is set to leave this month in a possible loan-to-buy deal, leaving Frank perilously short of options in the heart of defence.