Sky Sports: "€30m" but "Tottenham want to pay less" will sound painfully familiar
A brave new world is what Tottenham fans were promised, and here we are once more surrounded by freebies and more stalling in the marketplace.
Florian Plettenberg is a prominent German sports journalist, reporter, and moderator specialising in football. He’s also been a reporter and moderator for Sky Sport Deutschland since January 2022. He hosts or contributes to the show Transfer Update.
Florian has added his insight to what appears to be the current stand-off between Spurs and Joao Palhinha. Palhinha joined Spurs on a season-long loan from Bayern Munich in August 2025, with an option to buy for around €30 million.
Spurs fans in particular have been delighted with the player, and rightly so. Joao performed solidly for Tottenham, helping us avoid relegation, earning praise as a defensive midfielder who adds both steel and experience. Manager Roberto De Zerbi has publicly supported keeping him.
There had been a hold-up, and now we may understand why.
“Talks are ongoing. Tottenham currently have good chances. However, as revealed, Spurs want to renegotiate with FC Bayern. The option to buy was set at €25m guaranteed, with potential add-ons that could raise the fee to up to €30m. Tottenham want to pay less.”
Spurs apparently now want to renegotiate with the German giants. It seems odd that add-ons would have been triggered in a season where we came so close again to relegation.
Fan comment on X was not kind to Spurs.
One said:
Leaving Bayern Munich just to go to Tottenham and haggle over a few million euros is a generational downgrade
Go back to Sporting CP if you actually want to win a league title, Joao. London is just empty promises and zero trophies. €25m for a player like Palhinha is already a complete steal in this market and Tottenham is still trying to renegotiate to pay less?
Classic small club mentality. This is why you guys will never win a serious trophy.
Another:
You better choose Sporting bro, Spurs are gonna get you relegated.
Tottenham have had financial issues, but they were self-inflicted. To me, this looks small-time, and the player may well be tempted to head home. The optics are not good.
Daniel Levy did leave, didn’t he?
When you look at the fact that Tel had an abysmal loan period, yet we still bought him, and Palhinha was excellent, but we are still wondering whether 25 million Youros is worthwhile, it seems like madness still exists in our club.
Spurs have to rebuild and having characters like Robertson, Gallagher and Palhinha is far better than what we finished 2024-25 with. Would we have stayed up if we had let the kids loose and not had Gallagher or Palhinha? I doubt it.
Signing the likes of Robertson, Gallagher and Palhinha will mean very little if we cannot get rid of Vicario, Romero, Bissouma and at least 2 of any of the front line (Richarlison and Solanke would be perfect!).
At 31 despite how good he was for us last season he’s not a €30 million player. We’ve just got. 32 year old Robertson on a free. As much as I want him to stay we’ve got to look beyond maybe one more season with him. €15 million max.