N'Koudou unfit, deal at risk

TRANSFER TALK

It would appear that if Georges-Kevin N'Koudou does eventually arrive at Tottenham then he will not be fit to play as he isn't training with Marseille, who don't want him getting injured to ruin any deal.
French outlet Le Phoceen are reporting that although Njie has been granted a French visa he hasn't received it yet so Marseille are not signing him yet until it arrives.

Now this puts Tottenham in a predicament because N'Koudou was all agreed a month ago and had a deal gone through then, then he would be training with Spurs and getting his fitness levels to where we need them to be. He could have gone to Australia and got some minutes while learning his role within our system and how he needs to adapt his game to our demands.

Instead, because of hold-ups with Clinton Njie Marseille are refusing to release N'Koudou. The hold up is all at the Marseille end and Tottenham are getting very frustrated. Marseille are running on a skeleton staff so everything takes longer, even the President who negotiated the deal, Vincent Labrune, is leaving.

We are now into August and N'Koudou hasn't even started pre-season training, Marseille won't let him train so he doesn't get injured. All he is doing is gym work, they recently had a training camp in Germany and N'Koudou didn't get taken.

When he arrives he'll be unfit, certainly unfit to play and that has resulted in us going back to Marseille and asking for a reduction in his fee or we pay less towards the wages of Clinton Njie. The deal is being painted that for Marseille to buy Njie, Spurs MUST buy N'Koudou at a good price. This seems to confirm that, as reported here, the two deals ARE linked, it isn't simply a case of Marseille trying to sign a replacement. They have looked linked all along to me despite reports to the contrary.

The French press are now saying Daniel Levy wants better terms for Tottenham because Marseille has not allowed N'Koudou to train for so long, which is obviously to our detriment. With Son away at the Olympics, if we get an injury to one of our wide men, N'Koudou wouldn't be fit enough to provide cover or know his role in our system, especially defensively and pressing in a group.

Changing the terms of the deal may put it in jeopardy, not changing them means we are paying for a player who isn't training and thus isn't fit. There have been many cases of that affecting players all season.

Marseille has prevented us getting a full pre-season into him, that has a knock-on effect, as does not learning the system and bonding with the players. During the season training has to concentrate on the upcoming game, rather than learning the system we play. The delay may well affect how he performs hence we are asking for reduced terms.

Nothing is straightforward in the world of football.

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