Toby Alderweireld is starting to put pressure on Tottenham

Toby Alderweireld is going out of his way to say he wants at Tottenham. That’s a clear tactic to bring Spurs back to the negotiating table.

It’s remarkable just how much the noise around Toby Alderweireld has changed over the last few weeks. During the heat of the summer, the media told anyone who would listen that he was desperate to leave Tottenham. Now, the Belgian defender is speaking out to deny those rumours. Instead, he insists that it’s his preference to remain with Spurs.

Alderweireld is now telling the media that reports claiming he “absolutely wanted” to leave Tottenham this season simply were “not true.” Instead, he claims the club made it clear they wanted him to stay early in the summer and he immediately shifted his focus towards winning his starting position back. As usual, the truth is likely somewhere in the middle.

Reports claiming Alderweireld was desperate to leave Spurs are almost certainly overblown. He may have flirted with several European powers in an effort to get a higher wage packet from someone, but he never did anything to alienate Tottenham in the process. If he really wanted to leave, he could have gone on strike to force the club’s hand. The fact that he never did anything close to that makes it pretty clear he wasn’t dead set on leaving.

On the other hand, it’s not as if Alderweireld is desperate to commit the rest of his prime to playing for Mauricio Pochettino. There’s clearly a disagreement between the player and club about how much he should be paid. Money isn’t everything to Alderweireld, but it’s clearly something. Tottenham’s refusal to meet his wage demands certainly caused him to look at all of his options this summer.

In the end, Alderweireld wasn’t able to find a club that could satisfy all of his demands. That is to say, he couldn’t find a club to pay him huge wages and provide him satisfaction on the pitch. The success Alderweireld has enjoyed at Spurs, combined with the integral role he can play in the squad definitely helped keep him in North London this summer.

The reason Alderweireld is going public with his desire to stay at Tottenham is because he and his representatives want to force Daniel Levy to return to the negotiating table. They still aren’t happy with Tottenham’s latest contract offer, but this is a clear attempt to find a suitable compromise. Tottenham fans should hope that Alderweireld’s latest power play is successful. If it is, he’ll sign a new contract to keep him at Spurs for the foreseeable future.