You can slander Daniel Levy for many things, but the idea that Spurs haven’t splashed the cash under his watch simply isn’t true.
Over the past five years, Tottenham’s net spend ranks only behind Chelsea’s scattergun and Manchester United’s incompetence. Despite the mammoth sale of Harry Kane in 2023, Spurs have still tallied a huge net spend of approximately £483m since the start of the 2020/21 campaign.
How well that money’s been spent is up for debate, although it’s worth noting that this has been a squad in constant need of rejuvenating since the departure of Mauricio Pochettino in 2019. The frequent change of manager has forced the higher-ups to at least attempt to build squads in multiple images.
Spurs spent big for Ange, and they’re bound to do the same for Thomas Frank despite the Dane’s ability to extract juice from stone. However, some will question whether a Spurs side competing in the Champions League will be able to attract the very best.
The club’s inability to sign the finished product (for the most part) boils down to the unwillingness to compete on the salary front. Levy's fetish for self-sufficiency means Tottenham boasted just the seventh-highest wage bill in the Premier League last season—behind Aston Villa and the other members of the so-called 'Big Six'.
Only one of our players ranks in the top 30 highest-paid players in the division, but whom is that greedy superstar compromising Levy's financial utopia?
Tottenham's highest-paid player is a club icon
It shouldn't come as too much of a surprise that captain Son Heung-min is the club's highest-paid player. The South Korean icon, according to Capology, is earning £190,000-a-week and is the 30th highest-paid star in the Premier League. For context, the likes of Christopher Nkunku, Antony, Mason Mount and Kai Havertz are all making more at their respective clubs.
There's a chance Son isn't at the club beyond the summer window.
Only the great Harry Kane and could-have-been-great Tanguy Ndombele have garnered salaries worth £200,000-a-week, and there were tenuous reports that Spurs were willing to double the former's pay packet to retain him in 2023.
Ivan Perisic earned a mammoth £180,000-a-week after joining on a free transfer to reunite with Antonio Conte, and he'd currently be the club's second-richest earner hadn't he moved on two summers ago. His salary just about topped James Maddison's £170,000-a-week and Cristian Romero's £165,000-a-week. If Spurs are to persuade the latter to buy into the Frank project, they may have to offer the outstanding Argentine a bumper new deal.
He's worth it, in my eyes.
Remarkably, only the aforementioned three sit in the division's top 100 biggest earners. Dejan Kulusevski is the fourth player earning more than £100,000-a-week, while strikers Dominic Solanke and Richarlison are on the cusp. Micky Van de Ven and potentially Pedro Porro will undoubtedly dabble with six figures when they (hopefully) sign contract extensions.
The make-up of this squad means Levy a gradual increase in the wage bill is inevitable as our developing stars sign new deals which reflect their age and growing prominence. For now, though, Levy will enjoy the fruits of the Premier League's most financially efficient manager of the past decade.