Ornstein: Tottenham in talks to sign Leeds’ Archie Gray after Brentford move collapses

According to David Ornstein of The Athletic, Tottenham Hotspur are in negotiations to make their first new signing of the summer transfer window — 18-year old midfielder Archie Gray from Leeds United. That’s interesting! What’s even more interesting is that there’s a high probability Spurs have done this by hijacking Brentford’s deal for the same player.

In other words — we got a real Tottenham Hotspur GAZUMPING on our hands here! Red alert! All hands to battle stations!

This story takes a little time to explain and involves taking a dive into the deep lore of Leeds United ITK, so settle back and let’s dig in.

Archie Gray is a central midfielder who only turned 18 years old in March, but his football is well beyond his years. A product of Leeds’ academy, he had a breakout campaign last season, starting 47 out of his 52 appearances in all competitions and playing 3500 minutes for one of the best teams in the Championship. That’s seriously impressive. Had Leeds not lost to Southampton in the playoff finals, he’d be a Premier League player right now and there’s no way Leeds would consider parting with him, but the financial reality of missing promotion has apparently hit the club like a ton of bricks.

Yesterday there was plenty of chatter online that Leeds were reluctantly willing to sell Gray to raise funds, with Leeds demanding a transfer fee as high as £40m. That’s a LOT of money for an 18-year-old English kid with one year in the Championship, but it apparently didn’t put off teams like Chelsea, Arsenal, and Liverpool, who were all supposedly tracking Gray as a player for the future.

However, a dip into Leeds ITK forums led to an account named — stay with me here — “Hairy Crackling” who was essentially the Leeds equivalent of someone like Paul O Keefe. Hairy Crackling dropped a bomb yesterday afternoon that Gray had agreed to make a move to Brentford this summer. That news was eventually reported by reputable journalists online, and it looked as though Gray had chosen regular playing time over a move to a high level Premier League club.

Or did it? There were also reports that Spurs were “hovering” over the Brentford/Gray deal, and this morning I woke up this morning to the news that Gray’s move to the Bees had collapsed, with Brentford rejecting a £35m transfer fee. Those same reports suggested Spurs were now in early but direct negotiations with Leeds for the transfer of Gray, and Gray would be interested in coming to Spurs if he leaves. There’s some pretty extensive circumstantial evidence that Spurs not only were waiting to see what happened with the Brentford deal, but might have actively hijacked it — a true England GAZUMPing, which is a beautiful and these days practically mythical beast in football.

So much for Hairy Crackling, huh?

Gray’s stat bars don’t pop when you look at FBRef, but Championship and youth watchers agree — he’s a superb talent, comfortable with the ball at his feet, adept at both carrying and passing, very good attacking instincts — a real player’s player. Last season, he was used as a bit of a utility player by Daniel Farke, playing both fullback positions, as a deep-lying six, an 8, and a more attacking 10. The defensive experience in particular could be useful for Tottenham as he would fit like a glove as an inverted fullback, though it’s not his best role. But what everyone seems to agree is that he’s a future England midfielder, and quite possibly a future Premier League star, which is why there have been plenty of top clubs — including Spurs — tracking him for months now.

Gray probably isn’t a lock-down starter for Spurs this coming season, but with Spurs in the Europa League there will be plenty of opportunities for him to play. Adding Gray to Pape Matar Sarr and Lucas Bergvall gives Spurs a pretty delicious and superbly talented young midfield core whose ability can scale along with Tottenham’s future ambitions. Signing Gray would be a bit of a lottery ticket, but if the club is building for the future he’s exactly the kind of player Spurs should be targeting. He’d also be both home grown and club trained by the time he turns 21.

It’s PSR Deadline Day, which means there’s a chance that some transfer moves across the league could happen. The fee hasn’t been disclosed, but it’s probably north of £35m which is a LOT for a kid who just legally became an adult three months ago, but also a potentially thrilling and savvy move. The talks between Spurs and Leeds are apparently in the early stages, but there’s a lot of excitement and optimism that they can get this across the line. Wouldn’t THAT be a great way to end the fiscal year?

And if you want more anecdotal evidence that this could happen faster than anyone anticipates, there’s this — Alasdair Gold has the day off today. Spurs have got this in the bag.