Tottenham Hotspur have completed the signing of midfielder Mateus Fernandes from West Ham United, paying a club-record fee to beat Manchester United to his signature. The move reunites Spurs with a young midfielder who the club believe matches their style and temperament.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m very excited for this next step,\u201d Fernandes explained. \u201cSpurs is a massive club and the Head Coach was a key part of why I have decided to join.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we spoke, it was very special. We look at football in the same way\u2014going onto the pitch as a strong team, with fight and energy, to try and win every game. I can\u2019t wait to get started, to meet the fans, to meet everyone, and give everything for the Club.\u201d<\/p>\n
Head Coach De Zerbi underlined why the club pursued Fernandes and how he sees the player fitting into Tottenham\u2019s midfield. \u201cI\u2019ve admired Mateus for a long time because he combines quality on the ball with the intensity and intelligence that are so important in the way we want to play.<\/p>\n
\u201cDespite his age, he already has good experience in the Premier League and has shown quality and consistency at this level. Mateus is comfortable under pressure, can progress the ball, works hard for the team and has the courage to make things happen in difficult moments.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe this is the ideal environment for him to continue his development and I\u2019m excited to start working with him.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fernandes will not be the only midfielder arriving this summer. Spurs have already sealed an agreement to sign Sandro Tonali from Newcastle United in a deal which will once again break the team\u2019s transfer record. Tonali boarded a flight from Milan on Thursday to finalise his switch to Spurs. He is due to join in a package worth as much as $132.8 million (\u00a3100 million), the vast majority of which is guaranteed.<\/p>\n
As he prepared to depart for Spurs, Tonali spoke to Sky in Italy about his impending move and, like Fernandes, pointed to the importance of De Zerbi. The two signings together underline Tottenham\u2019s midfield overhaul ahead of the 2026\/27 season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Mateus Fernandes joins Tottenham for a club-record fee; he cites the Head Coach as decisive, Tonali.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16076,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1669,969],"tags":[1081,983],"class_list":["post-16077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-london-football","category-premier-league","tag-adaptation","tag-agents"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16077","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16077"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16077\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}