Davinson Sanchez is one of the current Tottenham Hotspur players who is most closely linked with a departure away from the club. He’s been linked to a number of clubs over the past month or so, but most closely to Galatasaray in Turkey, who reportedly had a big interest.
But now there could be a breakthrough. Colombian journalist Pipe Sierra is now tweeting (oh, ahem, sorry — “Xing”) that Sanchez is close to a €12m to Spartak Moscow, with the clubs already agreeing a fee and personal terms expected to be hammered out shortly.
EXCL. Davinson Sánchez (27) está muy cerca de convertirse en nuevo jugador del #SpartakMoscow . Ya hay un acuerdo con #Tottenham y esperan en las próximas horas cerrar los términos personales del colombiano
El defensa no ve con malos ojos su llegada al fútbol ruso pic.twitter.com/7jmvXyYh9j
— Pipe Sierra (@PSierraR) July 24, 2023
For the same reason that I gravitate towards sources in smaller regional English sources over the national papers, I also tend to trust journalists in the same countries as players. So when a Colombian journalist says that there’s a deal in place with Spartak, it gives it a feeling of greater authenticity, at least to me. It’s not a perfect system, but it seems to be accurate more often than not.
In this case though I have some questions. Spartak, of course, is a Russian Premier League club and you might have heard that there’s a war on. It’s not clear to me whether there would be any sanctions or repercussions from an English club selling a player to a Russian one, or what other kind of ramifications there might be for such a move. Without getting too deep into the sociopolitical ramifications (and you shouldn’t either, fair warning for the comments), it certainly is an eye-raising choice.
To be sure, €12m seems fine for Sanchez, if only to just get him off the books and out of the club. I have no issue with the price, or with the sale. I’d assume if this goes through that he’d fly from Singapore, where Spurs are currently on tour, to Moscow to finish the deal.
