Savinho's Potential £70m Move to Tottenham: Man City Training Absence
Savinho was missing from Manchester City’s open training session on Thursday. On the face of it, the club put it down to illness. Behind the scenes, the story is far more pointed.
Tottenham Hotspur have chased the Brazil international for over a year. They missed out last summer. This time, they are acting like a club that refuses to take no for an answer.
Roberto De Zerbi has signed off the move. The new Spurs head coach wants at least two fresh attackers in before the 1 September deadline, and Savinho sits high on that list. This is not a scouting whim. It is a manager-backed target.
Player pushes for Spurs switch
Fabrizio Romano reported on Thursday afternoon that Savinho has again told City he wants to leave and join Tottenham. The message has been repeated this week: his preference is clear, and it points towards north London.
Romano has spoken in recent weeks of a “very good chance” that Spurs get the deal done, though there is a familiar catch. City want a replacement lined up before they let him go, a stance mirrored in their stance on another Tottenham target, Cody Gakpo at Liverpool.
Even so, momentum is building. A well-placed Tottenham source on X has claimed within the last 24 hours that the Savinho deal is expected to reach a positive conclusion within a week, with the fee anticipated to land around the £70m mark.
For a 22-year-old who has not nailed down a starting spot at City, that is a huge number.
Big backing for De Zerbi – but at what cost?
Tottenham have already shown they are prepared to spend aggressively for De Zerbi as they try to haul themselves back up the Premier League after back-to-back 17th-placed finishes. The statement deals for Mateus Fernandes and Sandro Tonali from West Ham United and Newcastle United, a combined £185m outlay, underlined that intent.
Savinho would be another expensive swing.
City signed him from Girona for £30m two years ago. Since then, he has made 84 appearances for the eight-time Premier League champions, but he never truly became a Pep Guardiola regular. New boss Enzo Maresca looks ready to cash in, and a near-£40m profit in that short space of time would be smart business for City.
For Spurs, the calculation is different. They are paying for potential, for upside, for a winger they believe can explode with regular minutes in a system designed for him.
Right now, the numbers do not scream £70m footballer. His output has been solid rather than spectacular, and there are no guarantees that a change of scenery alone will transform him.
Gamble or game-changer?
Still, there is a reason Tottenham keep coming back. Savinho has trained and played in one of the most demanding environments in Europe. He has shown enough flashes to convince De Zerbi that, with trust and continuity, there is a far higher ceiling to hit.
At Spurs, he would not be fighting for scraps of game time behind a stacked cast of attackers. He would be a marquee piece in a rebuilt frontline, a winger signed to start, not to wait.
That is the bet: that regular football under a manager who clearly rates him turns promise into production and makes £70m look like foresight rather than folly.
For now, though, the reality is stark. Tottenham are on the verge of paying top-tier money for a player who still has plenty to prove. If Savinho does get his wish and walks out at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in white, the question will not be whether they overpaid.
It will be how quickly he can make the price irrelevant.
