Ex-PSG Standout Reveals Reason for Signing With Tottenham After Chelsea Spurn

Tottenham Hotspur secured Xavi Simons this past summer transfer window, edging out Chelsea. Moreover, PSG would benefit from this move due to the sell-on clause in their agreement with RB Leipzig.

Before the summer transfer window closed, transfer expert Fabrizio Romano reported that Tottenham agreed on a €60 million fee with RB Leipzig for Simons.

London rivals Chelsea spent most of the summer monitoring Simons but never made a formal offer to RB Leipzig, waiting instead to offload players like Christopher Nkunku and Nicolas Jackson before committing.

That opened the door for Tottenham, who swooped in to sign the Netherlands international after missing out on Morgan Gibbs-White and Eberechi Eze earlier in the window.

Xavi Simons Explains Tottenham Hotspur Move

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For PSG, it didn’t matter who Simons went to; they were just hoping Leipzig sold the player to the highest bidder. Nonetheless, the 22-year-old admitted that his conversation with Thomas Frank convinced him that moving to Tottenham would be the right step for his development.

“The manager (Frank) told me a lot,” Simons told Eindhovens Dagblad. “Positive things, but also things I need to improve. It’s fantastic how he sees football, how he wants to make players better. Spurs is the right place for me to develop.

“And it’s great that he was honest, that he wants to improve things for me. I always think the coaches are the most important people to base a decision on. As a player, you see a coach more than your family.

“What needs to be improved? I prefer to keep that to myself, but I heard different things from Thomas Frank than from other coaches in the past. That makes sense. When I went to PSV, I was much younger, so you have to work on different things then than you do now.”