Tottenham are preparing for life without Harry Kane and looking for potential replacements should he complete a transfer away from the club.
The Spurs ace wants to leave north London in a bid to win major honours for the first time in his career.
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Having missed out on the Carabao Cup this term, and seen the club’s title challenge crumble into smithereens, the exit door is opening.
Whether he makes it through depends on a unique set of circumstances only chairman Daniel Levy is likely to define.
Tottenham won’t let their talisman go on the cheap, even if the coronavirus pandemic has seen values tumble, with clubs missing out on money with fans unable to attend games.
Manchester United, Man City, and Chelsea may want the England captain but he will cost £150million, at least.
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More importantly for Spurs, they will need to have an adequate replacement for Kane.
There is no way a player coming in could possibly guarantee the 20 Premier League goals the 27-year-old does, or indeed, offer the playmaking ability he has also contributed this season.
A top forward must arrive in N17 if he does go though, so who are some contenders? talkSPORT.com takes a look.
Andre Silva (Eintracht Frankfurt)
A move to AC Milan in 2017 may not have worked out quite how he originally planned but the Portugal ace has shown what he’s all about in Germany.
In two Bundesliga campaigns, one on loan, he’s managed 39 goals in 56 games, which is some feat.
Silva has 27 league goals this term – two more than Erling Haaland, who is also wanted by top clubs.
He’s a natural goalscorer and has averaged 0.64 non-penalty expected goals per 90 over the last year too, so he’s tallies are hardly overperformance or luck.
So good was his form at the start of 2021 he was the Bundesliga’s Player of the Month for January.
But, having signed permanently with Frankfurt in September last year, he’s going to cost a fairly high sum.
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Ollie Watkins (Aston Villa)
It’s been a huge season for the former Brentford man who has shown he’s more than capable of performing on the highest stage.
Not only has he netted 13 Premier League goals this year, he’s also become an England international – and scored on his debut against San Marino.
He could have joined Spurs last summer but was told he would be understudy to Kane, so he opted to move to Villa instead.
Speaking to the Super 6 podcast, Watkins said: “There were quite a few teams interested. There was Leeds. Leeds were interested in me but then they signed Rodrigo. Tottenham were interested in me.
“They made it clear that if Harry Kane’s fit he was going to play so I did have that in the back of my mind but they said that with the schedule… with the Europa League… that there were a lot of games coming up so I had big decisions to make and, in the end, I felt like I made the right one.”
Will Tottenham go back and fork out a much bigger fee than the initial £28m Villa paid?
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Andrea Belotti (Torino)
Replacing Kane is no mean feat but bringing in an experienced top-level target man is probably the best approach.
The Turin-based side have struggled in Serie A in the last two seasons, finishing 16th in 2019/20, while currently occupying 17th spot, just outside the relegation zone.
And yet Belotti is still regularly hitting the back of the net for his club and for the Italian national team.
He’s scored at least 10 league goals in his six campaigns with the club, and hit 26 in 2016/17.
Belotti can be creativity too and has six assists this term and 28 in the league across his six-year spell.
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Dominic Calvert-Lewin (Everton)
The England international has built on last season’s tally of 13 Premier League goals with 16 so far this term, and he’ll surely think he should have netted more too.
A talented penalty box striker, Calvert-Lewin, 24, may feel he needs to move on to a bigger club, just like Kane does, having seen his side fall away at the end of the current campaign.
With big money transfers not quite firing on all cylinders this term, the Toffees may need to cash in a little to get some of the upgrades they need.
Like Tottenham, they may sell if the right offer comes in, and with Spurs set to have big budget, you can’t blame them agreeing for the greater good at Goodison Park.
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Sasa Kalajdzic (Stuttgart)
You may not have heard too much about the Austrian striker given he’s only in his first season in a top European league.
Nonetheless, he’s netted 16 Bundesliga goals and Scottish fans might remember the two goals he scored against them in March this year.
Spurs have already been linked with the player, as have Juventus, Borussia Dortmund and RB Leipzig.
He’s been compared to Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Peter Crouch thanks to his 6ft 5in height, but is far more creative, like Kane has been this season, due to the fact he was a midfielder in his younger days.
Stuttgart won’t lose him without a fight though.
“We know how good he is. We will hold talks with Sasa in the summer at the latest, either before or after the European Championship,” the club’s sporting director Sven Mislintat told Bild.
“Sasa is completely relaxed. He knows how we supported him when he was injured. We didn’t sign anyone for his position and always believed in him. He’s now repaying that trust with heart and soul.”
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