You make more news these days by being involved in some transfer rumors to a Premier League club than by scoring two goals in the Olympics semifinal, and as impressive as Leandro Damiao of Brazil has been throughout the Olympic tournament, his move from Internacional to Tottenham is a bit more interesting.
The 23 year old striker has already scored six goals in the U-23 tournament in London, including twice in the semifinal 3-0 win over South Korea, as Brazil look on course to win their first ever gold medal in the football tournament, as hard as it is to believe. Damiao has scored in four of the five games Brazil have played thus far and if the interest in him was strong before, Tottenham seem rabidly interested in him now.
Internacional, who have already sold one player to a London club this summer (Oscar to Chelsea), are playing the usual game of denials, saying that they haven’t been approached and then that they’ve rejected a Spurs offer and then that they’ve rejected offers from other clubs as well. Nothing new.
But with Tottenham having only one striker at the moment, Jermain Defoe, they seem persistent about signing the Internacional striker, who has scored 70 goals in 115 matches in all competitions for the club since 2010. Andre Villas-Boas has been scouting in Brazil even before his official entrance to the Tottenham job, and the club have already made one successful deal with Internacional in the past for Sandro. While the move hasn’t worked out so well so far, Spurs hope that the previous relationship might help this transfer go to work once the Olympics are over.
Tottenham wouldn’t be so desperate to land strikers if the Adebayor deal would be finalized, but the Togolese striker wants a substantial “goodbye package” from Manchester City because he’s so gracious to give up a future salary. The Luka Modric situation isn’t resolved completely, but it has seemed that Real Madrid have chosen to go with Axel Witsel, keeping the Croatian midfielder disgruntled and disappointed that promises weren’t kept.