Manor Solomon is expected to make the move to Tottenham Hotspur this week and it is the type of transfer that will always catch the eye of the north London club.
The Israel international, who turns 24 later this month, will arrive on a free transfer for Ange Postecoglou's squad if all is smoothed over with FIFA and Shakhtar Donetsk. The winger, who was on loan at Fulham last season, did have a contract with Shakhtar until the end of this year but FIFA granted the right to all non-Ukrainian nationals playing in that country to be able to suspend their own contracts amid the conflict in the country, a suspension which extends beyond the end of Solomon's deal.
Spurs play the Ukrainian club in a friendly at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on August 6 and Solomon could end up lining up against his old side. The young winger has previously spoken about being in Kyiv at the time of the Russian invasion in February 2022 and waking to the sound of explosions.
Tottenham announced last week that with the friendly match next month they will "make a financial contribution and an additional donation of net proceeds from ticket sales to ‘Shakhtar Social’, which has provided financial support, humanitarian and medical assistance to children and families across Ukraine since the conflict began".
So what are Spurs getting in Solomon? They are getting a young player with plenty of experience across the game, in the Premier League, Champions League, Europa League, FA Cup and also in the international game with 35 appearances for Israel and seven goals for his country.
He's a tricky winger with a little burst of acceleration. He needs to improve his output, particularly when it comes to assists, but it's worth pointing out that the goals he has scored in the Champions League in recent years have come against Manchester City, Real Madrid twice and Atalanta. He does rise to the occasion.
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In the Premier League last season, Solomon scored against Brighton, Brentford, Wolves and Nottingham Forest and in the FA Cup against Leeds during a great run.
Solomon had to overcome a tough start to his time at Fulham. The 23-year-old made his Premier League debut in a draw against Liverpool only to suffer a knee injury in a behind-closed-doors friendly shortly after. That required surgery and meant the winger did not return again until 2023, named on the bench against Leicester in January.
He slowly began to build up his confidence and fitness and Fulham boss Marco Silva started to unleash him in fits and bursts from the bench to terrorise tired defences late in matches.
It worked a treat as Solomon scored in five consecutive matches stretching from mid-February into early March, a couple of the goals wonderful curling efforts. He became the first Israeli to score in three or more consecutive Premier League fixtures since Ronny Rosenthal in 1992, a couple of years before the striker joined Tottenham from Liverpool.
Although he did not become a regular starter after that goal glut, Fulham and Silva had wanted to keep Solomon, only for Spurs to enter the picture.
Solomon will become Tottenham's third new face of the summer following the £17million signing of Guglielmo Vicario from Empoli and the £40million arrival of James Maddison from Leicester. The club have also made the loan moves of Dejan Kulusevski and Pedro Porro permanent for £25.7million and £34.4million respectively.
Spurs always enter a transfer window with two objectives. First are the priority targets, which football.london revealed this summer would be a goalkeeper, two centre-backs, a central attacking midfielder and a young winger. Then there is the second objective, which is to identify potential young stars for the first team and secure them quickly and quietly ahead of others whenever possible.
There is also a third strand to a transfer window, which is replacing players who unexpectedly leave to tempting offers but come from areas within the squad with little depth. For example, should Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg depart this summer, with two years left on his contract, then Spurs are expected to look for another central midfielder to slot into his place.
For the primary objective, Vicario and Maddison have ticked two of the boxes while Solomon, although free, just about falls into the young winger category as squad cover. As for the centre-backs, Spurs have a strong interest in Bayer Leverkusen's Edmond Tapsoba, Wolfsberg's Micky van de Ven and Fulham defender Tosin Adarabioyo. They need to strengthen a defence that conceded 63 goals in the Premier League alone last season.
Barcelona president Joan Laporta said this week that he expects to reach an agreement with Tottenham for Clement Lenglet to join permanently. It is still undecided from Spurs' end at this point whether they will press the button on bringing back the Frenchman, although it clearly is an option that he could cover one of those two summer centre-back slots. A third defender arrival would be dependent on just how many head out of the door.
As for the secondary objective - the signing of young players in any position - there are likely to be further arrivals in what is now just under two months of the transfer window. Previous recent examples of quietly going about securing young talent, often using a loan back to reduce the fee and continue their development, has come with then teenagers Pape Matar Sarr and Destiny Udogie from Metz and Udinese respectively.
Djed Spence and Bryan Gil ended up becoming such players, although the initial plan was to give them some experience in the Spurs environment, only for Antonio Conte to decide they were not ready.
Solomon could yet go either way under Postecoglou. He may well end up being a bargain signing that ends up paying for himself down the line in future moves or, with his Premier League experience already, he could prove to be an unexpected hit for the Australian in his attacking system.
At this point, he's likely to be a bench option in a season with fewer matches, unless injuries open the door for him. Solomon, who attracted the interest of Arsenal while he was at Shakhtar, is more naturally a right-footer playing on the left, which pitches him up against Son Heung-min.
The Israel international can also play on the right, where he would come up against Kulusevski and currently Gil, while Porro could also be used in that role this season by Postecoglou when required.
Solomon is still seen as a raw product, technically very good and tactically bright but it's unclear whether he will become a top player yet. It's worth noting the low number of assists over his career, similar to Lucas Moura who left Spurs this summer. There were no assists for Solomon at Fulham and it's an area of his game that must improve. The lack of a transfer fee at least reduces the element of risk in the transfer for Tottenham.
One of Spurs' biggest problems this summer is one they constantly struggle with, getting players out of the door for good money. Tottenham's most expensive recruits often prove to be the most difficult to shift and that is not only a damning indictment of their recruitment over the years, but also shows how much money they throw away on players they then have to continuously loan out for little to no fees.
A more data-led approach this year, in keeping with other Premier League clubs, is expected to help prevent the number of mistakes made. With Solomon's contract situation and the data studied on him, the young winger was a gamble with little risk and player with plenty of upside that Postecoglou can work with.
