Tottenham Hotspur have long been linked with Benfica centre-half Morato, and the latest report suggests the North London club are ready to splash the cash to land the ‘priority’ signing.
Tottenham badly needed to strengthen their defense this year after poor performances in the previous campaign, and Micky van de Ven’s signing helped to greatly contribute to that effort.
The Dutchman suffered a hamstring injury during the Spurs team’s loss to Chelsea at the beginning of the month, ending his excellent defensive pairing with Cristian Romero.
Since then, there has been a lot of speculation that in order to strengthen his defense for the second half of the season, Ange Postecoglou will try to recruit a new center-back during the January transfer window.
Tottenham need to spend big to land Morato
The Daily Mail claims that one player the Lilywhites are thinking about is defender Morato of Benfica. The Brazilian’s current team is eager to cling onto him, therefore making the signing will not be simple (Record as cited by Sport Witness).
The most recent information now available comes from the Portuguese publication O Jogo (via Sport Witness), who state that Tottenham has “intensified their observations” of Morato and has made the Benfica player a “priority” in the transfer market due to van de Ven’s injury.
The issue is that Benfica won’t part with their player and won’t make it “easy” for Spurs to acquire him. According to speculation, the Portuguese team may take use of Morato’s €100 million (£86 million) release clause to force the North London team to “open their purse strings.”I think Morato would be a great addition to our team under Postecoglou and that he has a nice look. But we shouldn’t overpay for the player, and we have to be cautious about a team like Benfica refusing to give up.
