Tottenham Hotspur entered the January transfer window desperately needing more help on the wings, and now the fan base has to be worried that Spurs are going to somehow enter February much, much weaker in their biggest area of need.
Spurs already sold Brennan Johnson for over 30 million euros to local rivals Crystal Palace, and while that was actually the right move considering the Wales international's lack of a clear role in the team, the right wing position is now a catastrophe with both Dejan Kulusevski and now Mohammed Kudus injured for the foreseeable future.
Worse yet, the best left winger in the squad, Mathys Tel, now understandably wants a loan move away from the unbridled incompetence of manager Thomas Frank, as he has been repeatedly snubbed out of the starting lineup by the manager despite being his team's best player at the position.
Tottenham are running out of options
Tottenham have shown interest in a wide variety of winger transfer targets, but none of them are biting. Antoine Semenyo already chose Manchester CIty over Tottenham, and neither Man City wingers Omar Marmoush or Savinho are interested in a move away; Savinho is actually injured.
The next top winger on Spurs wish list is 19 year old RB Leipzig prospect Yan Diomande, who already has six Bundesliga goals and is widely viewed as the next big thing at the position - kind of like Tel used to be. In fact, Bayern Munich want to sign him badly as the Luis Diaz understudy, while familiar Tottenham transfer rivals Yan Diomande are also very interested in him.
Spurs have been holding out hope that Leipzig would be interested in selling Diomande to them this winter, and Leipzig's recent addition of Nigerian winger Sani Suleiman seemed to point in the direction of the Ivorian international Diomande potentially being floated on the transfer market.
Unfortunately for Tottenham Hotspur, it looks like that won't be the case and Spurs will have to wait until the summer to try and bag Yan Diomande. According to a report from Fabrizio Romano on his YouTube channel, Tottenham have already tried to sign Diomande this month but were told by Leipzig that a deal is impossible to complete. Leipzig will not let Diomande leave their club this winter, as they are instead only interested in listening to offers in the summer with Bayern Munich, Manchester United, Tottenham, and even Ligue 1 powerhouse PSG all interested.
That is quite the scary group of clubs in on Diomande, and Tottenham have to be ready for an even fiercer transfer battle than they thought. But the one beneficiary of all this is young Tottenham left winger Mathys Tel, who has been wanting out of the club for a lack of minutes.
Had Spurs been able to sign Diomande this winter, Tel would have almost certainly wanted out, due to having even less minutes if Spurs were to invest a ton of money into Diomande right here and right now. Diomande's rejection means Tel is still the top guy on the left wing in Tottenham, and Spurs still have a shot at not losing him on loan (or worse). With Diomande off the table, it has never been more obvious to Thomas Frank and Tottenham: Mathys Tel is the guy. Play the man.