Postecolgou spoke to player four times before he signed for Spurs – Journalist

Ben Jacobs has explained that Ange Postecoglou kept in close contact with Radu Dragusin right through the transfer saga this month, with the Australian alleged to have spoken to the centre-back regularly in the days leading up to his arrival at Hotspur Way.

There is understandably a lot of excitement at Spurs about Dragusin’s arrival, with the centre-back signing for the club after an extremely impressive 18-month spell at Genoa.

Tottenham’s recruits from Serie A over the last couple of years have all been big hits and the club will be hoping the Romanian also goes on to fulfil his potential in N17 and become a key player for Ange Postecoglou.

It was widely reported that Spurs saw off competition from Bayern Munich to land the centre-back, a detail which Dragusin himself confirmed, telling The Athletic a couple of weeks ago that he felt the North London side would be the ‘right step’ for him at this stage of his career.

Dragusin had four conversations with Postecoglou

Jacobs has now revealed that talks of Bayern hijacking the deal were vastly overblown as Spurs were always confident of wrapping up the deal for Dragusin.

The journalist also explained that the former Genoa man’s conversations with Postecoglou were decisive, with the pair alleged to have spoken on four occasions before the transfer was finalised.

Jacobs said on the Last Word on Spurs podcast about the Dragusin deal: “They (Tottenham) were very confident and optimistic of getting it done quickly, and they got it over the line. And yes, there was a Bayern hijack. But they were too late in the race.

“And even though there were some very public, and I thought bizarre comments to say in the aftermath that somehow the player was wowed by Bayern but gave his word to Spurs, the reality is that for all the noise, he’s a Tottenham player.

“And if he wanted to go to Bayern, he could’ve gone to Bayern. So we have to assume that Tottenham is his number one choice despite some agent comments suggesting that it was a really hard decision, and almost implying, if we’re reading between the lines, that if Bayern had bothered to come earlier, it might have been a different story.

“But the optimism was always there from Tottenham. And the reason for that was again Ange Postecoglou being decisive. I’m told that he had four conversations with the player in the space of about 72 hours and kept in contact with him. Postecoglou made sure that every single day in the build-up to that transfer happening, Dragusin was aware of the Tottenham project.”

Spurs Web Opinion

While Bayern are obviously a huge club, the pull of the Premier League would have likely played a significant factor in Dragusin’s decision. At this moment in time, there are not too many more exciting projects around Europe than the one that is underway at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.

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