Agent Stefano Antonelli suggested that ‘everyone wanted’ his client Destiny Udogie before his move to Tottenham and discussed his expectations for the January transfer window.
The Italian left back was purchased by Spurs from Udinese last year in a deal worth around €18m. After spending a final season with the Friulian outfit, he headed to North London in the summer to join Ange Postecoglou’s squad.
Apart from his disastrous outing against Chelsea, Udogie has impressed in his first few months with Tottenham, providing two assists across his first 10 Premier League appearances. The 20-year-old made his Italy debut under Luciano Spalletti in the international break last month.
Speaking to TMW, agent Antonelli first spoke about his expectations for the January transfer market in Serie A.
“It’s always the same, the same thought as always. ‘We don’t have a euro, we’re in crisis, we can only exchange stickers’… Certainly there are problems, but the top of the class in Serie A will move.
“Juventus will sign Phillips on an expensive loan, with a buy option at the end, because they will not add obligations but options, it means that they are moving.
“Then someone will sell to the Premier League, there €25-30 million is an acceptable and possible budget, not here. There is not one of the top six in Italy that will put such figures on the table for someone in January.
“If they prove me wrong, I will be very happy but in January I don’t think they will. It will take managerial intelligence, ideas and solutions that will be adopted.”
He was asked about the changes after Napoli’s decision to sack Rudi Garcia.
“Garcia is saturated, whoever arrives in his place will see a Napoli that will have to correct the team on the fly.
“There won’t be a huge investment: they will do operations like Anguissa, an extraordinary midfielder, and Napoli are good at signing with a buy option. Kim, like Smalling, this is what we can do in Italy.”
He spoke about Udogie’s exclusion from the Italy squad for their final two Euro 2024 qualifiers against North Macedonia and Ukraine.
“The first to be displeased is Spalletti. In the last few call-ups, he has given strong signals. Unfortunately, in the match against Sheffield United, at home, Destiny had a flexor problem.
“Tottenham did everything to recover him against Chelsea, which was also an unfortunate match, he played 60 minutes before the red but afterwards it was deemed appropriate not to take any risks, there would have been the risk of a relapse.
“Until his last, Destiny tried to convince the Tottenham staff that for him the national team was something exceptional, he is a twenty-year-old who told me ‘we want to make history, being part of this group in the run-up to the European Championship means being part of history’.”
Finally, Antonelli reflected on the various clubs interested in signing Udogie before he joined Tottenham.
“If there is a limit that Italian clubs still cannot overcome today, it is the courage to invest. I invite anyone and I challenge anyone to tell me which Italian club didn’t want Udogie.
“They all wanted him, at that stage, the only one who thought it appropriate to accelerate was Gino Pozzo with Udinese. He signed him for €2.8m and sold him after ten months for €26m.
“Now with what he is doing he doesn’t have a defined price, but we spoke with Juventus, with Milan, with Inter…
”Everyone liked Destiny, everyone wanted him but at that moment there wasn’t the impetus to define this operation. We don’t invest in Italians, it’s a commonplace that also happened to Udogie.”