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The toughest negotiator in football. Patience, temperance, risk. Negotiating a signing with Daniel Levy, the relentless Tottenham president, is a tough task. The Harry Winks loan talks to the VCF are a new example.
Diners enjoy dining with panoramic views of Biscayne Bay at Miami’s Cipriani restaurant, famous for its steak tartare. It is then that the representative of Everton, one of the participating clubs in the Guinness tournament, addresses Amadeo Salvo, president of Valencia: “How did you get Daniel Levy to pay a termination clause?” Roberto Soldado’s sale to Tottenham in August 2013 is almost a milestone. This is one of the few examples in which Daniel Philip Levy (Essex, 1962), the toughest negotiator in world football, bowed to a club’s demand to pay the clause for a footballer. Del Valencia could only negotiate the payment terms.
This is not usually the case. Levy not only has a habit of winning conversations, but also leaves rival interlocutors upset. Sir Alex Ferguson describes it in his book Leadership referring to the negotiations to sign Spurs star forward Dimitar Berbatov, who would end up leaving for Old Trafford, only after some grueling talks: “It hurt less when they operated on my hip,” Fergie says. Former Dinamo Zagreb CEO Zdravko Mamic told Four Four Two magazine that on the occasion of Luka Modric’s move to Tottenham in 2008, he asked Levy for five London team jerseys. It was almost a souvenir of sorts after sealing the sale of the rising Croatian star. Levy accepted, in exchange for discounting the price of the shirts from the amount of 21 million in which the operation had been closed. Veteran Jean-Michel Aulas, owner of Olympique de Lyon, who along with patriarchs such as Jorge Pinto da Costa (Porto) has a reputation as a shark in the tug of war of signings, surrendered to Levy’s negotiating art in the transfer of the goalkeeper Hugo Lloris to the Lilywhites. “I haven’t seen a thing like it in 25 years.” With persuasive leaders, such as Florentino Pérez, Levy has ended up making friends and invitations to the mansion in Boca Ratón after the operations of Modric or Bale.
Levy reappears on the road to Valencia. The Mestalla club wants Harry Winks and the English midfielder seems delighted with the idea of landing on loan to have the minutes that guarantee him to be in the final race to go to the Eurocup. But, beyond Mourinho’s strategy, Valencia has yet to overcome a stumbling block, a great dam actually, the wall against which hundreds of sales and transfers have run aground. Levy, the longest-serving manager in his position in the entire Premier, has curbed the option of Valencia not only assuming the Winks tab, but also demanding that he pay for the loan.
De Stratford a Oxford Street
Of Jewish descent, Levy connects with the Hebrew tradition of a club he has been a fan of for as long as he can remember. He grew up in the family business environment. Grandfather Abraham’s headgear in Stratford, east London, was transformed by his father into Mr Byrite, a menswear chain that in the 1980s Daniel, with his brothers Jonathan and Robert, gave the necessary impetus until, now Named as Blue Inc, reaching the heart of Oxford Street. Feared by the clubs, the rules are just as rigid in internal coexistence. Mauricio Pochettino knows this, who during his stay at White Hart Lane constantly friction with Levy over his reservations when it comes to spending on transfers. Critical of the market investment model of the big English clubs for seeing it unsustainable, Levy only agreed to make big signings in the summer of 2019 (Ndombele and Lo Celso), because Pochettino had won it by reaching the Champions League final. A few months later, the Argentine coach would be dismissed, accusing the rigors of a very worn block. But on the financial control of Levy, Tottenham has managed to lift the project of its luxurious new stadium, without moving from its roots in East London.
How did Salvo dissuade Levy in 2013? The operation required time, a variable that Levy dominates (famous is the expression “Levy hour” on the last day of each transfer window). But also temperance and risk, that of pushing negotiations to the limit and breaking them. Tottenham’s sports director, Franco Baldini, landed in Valencia with an offer of 25 million. At the meeting, at the Meliá Cortes Valencianas hotel, Salvo declared the negotiations closed, enraging Levy. Valencia was certain that if Baldini, their strong man, had moved to Spain it was because they planned to pay the 30 “kilos” clause. Those of Mestalla did agree to negotiate the form of payment.
The negotiation was closed by phone, while Salvo returned from a LaLiga meeting in Barcelona. The route cut off the signal, a circumstance that upset a very direct Levy in his oratory. With Salvo standing in a freeway service area, the pact arrived. The claim of the coach Villas-Boas was to sign Soldado yes or yes. Valencia did not lower the price, but the agreement was quick with the form of payment for the exuberant financial solvency of Tottenham. From a very tough negotiation, a friendship remained that continues to this day. With Harry Winks comes the new assault.
Mourinho rules out the exit, but Levy continues negotiating
José Mourinho closed the door yesterday to the loan of Winks. A strategic staging in a negotiation that is still open. «It’s not going anywhere, I don’t know how to say it anymore, when I say it’s not going to come out, it’s not going to come out. It is true that he has not played much, but lately he has had more participation. If any club wants to talk about signing him, my recommendation is that he does not waste time because he is not going to leave.
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