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Spurs’ Transfer Rumors: Shilow Tracey Joins Tottenham Hotspur

By Alexander Balano

Jul 23, 2014; Toronto, Ontario, Canada; Tottenham Hotspur head coach Mauricio Pochettino on the sidelines against Toronto FC at BMO Field. Tottenham defeated Toronto 3-2. Mandatory Credit: John E. Sokolowski-USA TODAY Sports
Jul 23, 2014; Toronto, Ontario, Canada; Tottenham Hotspur head coach Mauricio Pochettino on the sidelines against Toronto FC at BMO Field. Tottenham defeated Toronto 3-2. Mandatory Credit: John E. Sokolowski-USA TODAY Sports /
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What are the latest Spurs’ Transfer Rumors right now?

It’s official, Shilow Tracey is now a member of Tottenham Hotspur. The 17-year-old Ebbsfleet United youth academy product joins Spurs after going on trial and traveling to Florida to take part in the IMG Cup and reaching the final. In that tournament, Tracey scored two goals in three appearances. Not enough to say that Shilow Tracey will be good, but the potential is definitely there.

Finally, here’s the last story. The Independent has created a list that has 18 players who are going to be out of contract by the summer. These are 18 players who are all good despite half of them being 30-years-old and older. But beggars can’t be choosers when it comes to an athlete’s age. So with that said, if Spurs want any of these players on a free transfer, it’s time to start negotiations especially with Sam Byram who’s still 22. These are the latest transfer rumors.

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No one knows exactly how Shilow Tracey will do with Spurs after recently completing his transfer for an undisclosed fee.

That being said, the 17-year-old is highly-rated by Ebbsfleet United and Tottenham, as well as Charlton Athletic, Crystal Palace, Ipswich Town, Reading and West Ham United who were monitoring his progress.

Therefore by default, Tracey is a promising youth prospect that has the potential to become the next star to join a Tottenham academy which has already produced some talented kids in Harry Kane, Josh Onomah, Ryan Mason etc.

Interestingly enough, Tracey was a product of Ebbsfleet United’s newest academy to be signed to a bigger club since owners KEH Sports created the academy. Here’s Fleet’s vice-chairman Peter Varney about the transaction:

"“This is a fantastic opportunity for Shilow and we are proud of the fact that our youth academy is producing quality young players just one year after we set it up.”“I would like to thank Spurs for the professional manner in which they have handled the transfer negotiations. I must also recognise the work done with Shilow by Daryl McMahon and his staff in our youth academy.”"

It seems that upon completion of this transfer, Shilow Tracey was set to join Spurs’ academy in Mexico to take part in the Copa Chivas and compete against the likes of Benfica, Boca Juniors and River Plate. Obviously those are three good teams to get Tottenham’s youth academy players into a very competitive game and see how far along they are in their development.

Free is always good. Who wouldn’t want free things? Even in football? Despite the age on a majority of these players with 14 of them being 27-years-old and older (nine of them being over 30), that’s the only negative thing. But other than that, what’s not to like? Here’s a list of 18 players that the Independent has compiled who can sign on a free contract this month:

  • Nemanja Vidić, 34, defender, free agent
  • Zlatan Ibrahimović, 34, striker, PSG
  • Víctor Valdés, 33, goalkeeper, Manchester United
  • John Terry, 35, defender, Chelsea
  • Steve Mandanda, 30, goalkeeper, Olympique Marseille
  • Robert Green, 35, goalkeeper, QPR
  • Branislav Ivanović, 31, defender, Chelsea
  • Joël Matip, 24, midfielder, Schalke (close to joining Liverpool, possibly)
  • Cristián Zapata, 29, defender, AC Milan
  • Martín Cáceres, 28, Juventus
  • Patrice Evra, 34, defender, Juventus
  • Sam Byram, 22, defender, Leeds United
  • Gregory van der Wiel, 27, defender, PSG
  • Sofiane Feghouli, 26, midfielder, Valencia
  • Hatem Ben Arfa, 28, midfielder, Nice
  • Éver Banega, 27, midfielder, Sevilla
  • Charlie Austin, 26, striker, QPR
  • Ezequiel Lavezzi, 30, striker, PSG

If anything, all of these players represent stop-gap or bridge options between one veteran player to a young up-and-coming talent. It’s to ease the process from one generation to another in a way, than say throwing players into the fire and potentially ruining their career before it begins.

More from Hotspur HQ

It’s happened to Spurs twice at two positions in the past couple of seasons. There were many more times that this happened, but these are two more prevalent examples that involves Tottenham’s current squad.

Granted at striker it was completely different but you could see how the idea took place. Going from Emmanuel Adebayor to Roberto Soldado and then Harry Kane only worked out because two of these strikers couldn’t produce goals at a sustainable rate.

But still, Soldado was the stop-gap between an enigmatic Adebayor who disappeared due to personal issues off the pitch. And Kane needed to learn and train with someone, so that’s where Roberto Soldado helped out.

At center-back, it went from Ledley King to Michael Dawson to Jan Vertonghen. This transition was smooth and while there were hiccups along the way with the center-back position, at least one of them, it settled quickly when Dawson and Vertonghen took over.

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Looking back at this list, Tottenham doesn’t need any of these players — unless Zlatan Ibrahimović wants to join Spurs — and that’s because there’s a youth movement going on. Anyone from this list wouldn’t necessarily hurt the club’s progress, but it would question this idea that Spurs are trying to build a young team and yet they’re signing players in their 30s on free contracts.

There is Sam Byram though who is the youngest player listed and he’s 22-years-old. But it’s unknown if Spurs are going to sign Byram from Leeds United which follows the Lilywhites’ blueprint of signing young players who are playing for a lower league team. With no transfer fee to speak of, a pre-contract right now would be great. Let’s see what Spurs do regarding Sam Byram.