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Exclusive: Tottenham line up move to sign £40m-valued ace if PL club get relegated
Tottenham are lining up a move for Nathan Ake if Bournemouth get relegated at the end of the season, Football Insider understands.
Spurs are in the market for at least one senior centre-back in the summer as Jose Mourinho continues the overhaul of the team that began in January.
A Tottenham source has told Football Insider that the club are keen on recruiting a left-sided centre-back who can also slot in at left-back.
Ake is on the Londoners’ target list as a like-for-like replacement for Jan Vertonghen, who turns 33 in April and is out of contract at the end of the season.
Spurs believe £40million-valued Ake will be far easier to prise from the Vitality Stadium if Eddie Howe’s side go down.
Bournemouth climbed out of the relegation zone with a 2-1 win over Aston Villa last weekend but are 16th in the Premier League table and only two points clear of danger.
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Ake is back in the team after recovering from a hamstring injury that sidelined him for a month, during which the Cherries lost three league matches out of five.
Tottenham have a longstanding interest in Ake and are set to watch him closely over the coming months.
The 24-year-old has made a big impression at Bournemouth since signing from Chelsea for £20million in the summer of 2017 after an initial spell on loan the previous campaign.
Ake started all 38 of their league matches last season and he has been in the XI for 20 out of 25 games in the competition this term, only missing out through injury.
Tottenham are short of homegrown players and are looking to rectify that in the coming windows.
They sealed three foreign signings in January – Steven Bergwijn, Gelson Fernandes on an initial loan and converting Giovani Lo Celso’s loan into a permanent move.
Ake – despite being Dutch – counts as a homegrown player, having left Feyenoord for Chelsea at the age of 16 and spent his formative years with the Premier League club.
In other Tottenham news, it can be REVEALED that the club are gearing up to offload a big Jose Mourinho favourite who started in win v Southampton.