The Guardian

Tottenham have stepped up their pursuit of Dominic Solanke and entered advanced talks with Bournemouth over signing the forward.

Ange Postecoglou said recently that the striker department was the “thinnest” of his Spurs squad. Solanke has emerged as the club’s preferred candidate and personal terms are not expected to be an issue.

Bournemouth’s owner, Bill Foley, confirmed this summer that Solanke’s deal until 2027 included a release clause of about £65m and the anticipated exit would be a club-record sale. Nathan Aké’s £40m transfer to Manchester City in 2020 was Bournemouth’s previous biggest departure.

Postecoglou gave the go-ahead for Spurs to pursue Solanke after the best season of the 26-year-old’s career. He scored 21 goals , including 19 in the Premier League, but also caught the eye with his pressing statistics and link-up play.

This expected transfer to Tottenham would give Solanke another opportunity at a top-six club, after he progressed through Chelsea’s academy as a teenager before he departed for Liverpool in 2017.

Tottenham have reached an agreement with Bournemouth over signing the forward Dominic Solanke for an initial £55m, plus £10m in add-ons. Ange Postecoglou said recently the striker department was the “thinnest” of his Spurs squad and Solanke emerged as the club’s preferred candidate.

Bournemouth’s owner, Bill Foley, confirmed this summer that Solanke’s contract until 2027 included a release clause of about £65m and the deal represents a club-record sale. Nathan Aké’s £40m transfer to Manchester City in 2020 was Bournemouth’s previous biggest departure.

Postecoglou gave the go-ahead for Spurs to pursue Solanke after the best season of the 26-year-old’s career. He scored 21 goals, including 19 in the Premier League, but also caught the eye with his pressing statistics and link-up play.

A transfer to Tottenham would give Solanke another opportunity at a top-six club, after he progressed through Chelsea’s academy as a teenager before he departed for Liverpool in 2017. He joined Bournemouth in 2019.

Chelsea have completed the signing of the Paris Saint-Germain defensive midfielder Oriane Jean-François on a three-year contract, with the option of a further year.

The 22-year-old France international sustained an anterior cruciate ligament injury in October 2023 but, before that, had enjoyed a bright start to her career, signing her first professional contract at Paris FC before moving across the French capital to their neighbours in 2022.

“It is a good moment for my career and the player I want to be,” Jean-François said of her move to the Women’s Super League champions. “I’m very happy to sign here and I’m excited to start my journey.”

Jean-François made her senior France debut in October 2020 and Chelsea’s general manager, Paul Green, praised his club’s new addition: “She has shown a great attitude and we are looking forward to seeing how she takes the next steps in her career while at the club.”

Tottenham have signed the England youth international defender Ella Morris on a free transfer following the expiration of her contract at the Championship side Southampton.

Morris, 21, has signed a deal with the north London club until 2027. She had been with Southampton since joining their youth academy at the age of 14. She helped them to win promotion to the second tier in 2022 and then made 23 appearances for the club last season.

The England midfielder Lucy Staniforth has signed an extended contract at Aston Villa until June 2025. The former Manchester United player has been with Villa since 2023 and has played 32 times for the West Midlands club.

“We are pleased to keep Lucy on board for another year,” Villa’s head of women’s football, Lee Billiard, said. “She possesses such experience, technical ability and knowledge of the game that rubs off on those around her.

“Lucy is a good leader on the field and an experienced head in games. We all missed her presence during the final months of last season but we are looking forward to having her back fit and healthy for the upcoming campaign.”

There are moments when tonight’s stop on Travis Scott’s Circus Maximus tour feels more metal gig than rap-show. It’s not just the numerous circle-pits (with the passion if not the ferocity of a Slayer crowd) or the boulder-strewn, prehistoric stage-set straight out of Masters of the Universe. It’s the blunt assault of the music – the buildup of tension and the cathartic relief, the puncturing, kinetic power of those drum-machine pulses – and how the tireless Scott commands this gargantuan stadium with sheer force of will, and a massive box of fireworks.

Sporting quarterback shoulder-pads, he bounds and pogos across the stage, the rich-guy ennui that sometimes fugs his records entirely absent. His energy is matched by his fans, whom he’s named “ragers”, and who jump when he says “jump!” and thrust their middle-fingers in the air when he asks them to do that. Little of the Dolby Atmos-ready, cathedral-of-sound aesthetic that made albums such as Astroworld and Utopia such psychedelic experiences survives the transition to this vast space. Instead, Scott leans on the pugilistic likes of Meltdown and No Bystanders, whose bold, bellowed hooks make Onyx sound like Clannad, and whose blitzing, acid-trap beats sound like early Schoolly D on steroids, coldly mechanical and raw.

It’s not all brawny bangers. Scott sings Bon Iver collab My Eyes bathed in green lasers upon a raised platform, his Auto-Tune-enhanced croon sounding like holy music – the sweetest dancehall balladry, a canary singing from a coalmine of chopped and screwed noise. In such intimate moments he holds his ragers rapt, turning them loose in the next breath and demanding they raise their middle fingers again. Scott’s a crowd-pleasing ham in the lineage of Freddie Mercury, stopping and starting a ground-shaking Fein so often it goes past Rickroll into genius, and bringing on Ice Spice to rap her Think U The Shit (Fart) to a fan waving an Ice Spice flag.

Tottenham have completed the signing of Archie Gray from Leeds in a deal that takes Joe Rodon back to Elland Road.

Gray, 18, has attracted plenty of admirers thanks to an impressive breakout season and after Brentford were unable to get a transfer over the line it opened the door for Spurs. The England Under-21 international has signed a six-year deal after Tottenham agreed to pay between £25m and £30m and allowed Rodon to return to Leeds on a permanent basis after he spent the past season on loan there.

Leeds’s failure to secure promotion via the Championship playoffs in May put pressure on them to make at least one lucrative sale to comply with financial fair play rules.

“Whilst we understand that supporters will be hugely disappointed to lose such a homegrown talent, and a family name so synonymous with Leeds United, the move improves the club’s chance to compete for automatic promotion next season by increasing our ability to build a competitive squad within the league’s financial control regulations,” Leeds said. “Everyone at Leeds United is heartbroken to see one of our own depart.” They said Spurs had “met a release clause that was triggered by the club’s failure to get promoted at the first attempt”.

Gray flourished to become one of Leeds’s most valuable assets, making 52 appearances at right-back and in the centre of midfield. He made his league debut in August against Cardiff.

Gray is from a prestigious footballing family, with his great-uncle Eddie and father, Andy, former Leeds players. Archie won the Championship young player of the year award.

Chelsea were among other clubs to register an interest but Gray was convinced Tottenham were his best destination after talks with Ange Postecoglou and will get the chance to play in the Europa League.

Rodon signed for Spurs from Swansea in 2020 but played 24 times for the club before spending two seasons on loan, the first at Rennes and 23-24 with Leeds.

Tottenham have completed the signing of Archie Gray from Leeds in a deal that takes Joe Rodon back to Elland Road.

Gray, 18, has attracted plenty of admirers thanks to an impressive breakout season and after Brentford were unable to get a transfer over the line it opened the door for Spurs. The England Under-21 international has signed a six-year deal after Tottenham agreed to pay between £25m and £30m and allowed Rodon to return to Leeds on a permanent basis after he spent the past season on loan there.

Leeds’s failure to secure promotion via the Championship playoffs in May put pressure on them to make at least one lucrative sale to comply with financial fair play rules.

“Whilst we understand that supporters will be hugely disappointed to lose such a homegrown talent, and a family name so synonymous with Leeds United, the move improves the club’s chance to compete for automatic promotion next season by increasing our ability to build a competitive squad within the league’s financial control regulations,” Leeds said. “Everyone at Leeds United is heartbroken to see one of our own depart.” They said Spurs had “met a release clause that was triggered by the club’s failure to get promoted at the first attempt”.

Gray flourished to become one of Leeds’s most valuable assets, making 52 appearances at right-back and in the centre of midfield. He made his league debut in August against Cardiff.

Gray is from a prestigious footballing family, with his great-uncle Eddie and father, Andy, former Leeds players. Archie won the Championship young player of the year award.

Chelsea were among other clubs to register an interest but Gray was convinced Tottenham were his best destination after talks with Ange Postecoglou and will get the chance to play in the Europa League.

Rodon signed for Spurs from Swansea in 2020 but played 24 times for the club before spending two seasons on loan, the first at Rennes and 23-24 with Leeds.

Archie Gray’s £40m move from Leeds to Brentford has collapsed at the 11th hour after the two clubs failed to agree a mutually-satisfactory payment structure, leaving Tottenham as new favourites for the 18-year-old’s signature.

Gray arrived in west London on Saturday and was poised to undergo a medical at Brentford on Sunday after agreeing personal terms but has now returned to Yorkshire. While that represents good news for Leeds supporters, it seems almost certainly to be a temporary state of affairs as Spurs are understood to have now made their interest in Gray clear to Elland Road officials.

Although Daniel Farke, the Leeds manager, does not want to lose his precociously-gifted midfielder or right back, he recognises the club needs to raise funds in order to comply with financial fair play regulations. This dictated that Brentford’s offer of an initial £35m transfer, potentially rising to £40m, was taken so seriously by the Leeds board.

Gray, the great nephew of the still-adored former Leeds player and manager Eddie Gray, does not turn 19 until next March and made 52 appearances in all competitions last season as Farke’s side narrowly missed out on promotion to the top tier, losing last month’s Championship playoff final to Southampton. Gray been extensively scouted by a number of clubs across Europe, including with Chelsea believed to also be interested in him.

After joining Leeds’s academy at the age of eight, Gray has represented England junior teams at every age group level up to and including Under-21s, while also winning the 2023-24 Young Championship player of the season award.

Meanwhile, Newcastle have moved to avoid the possibility of a points deduction by agreeing to sell their 21-year-old homegrown midfielder Elliot Anderson to Nottingham Forest in a deal potentially rising to £35m. After selling their 19-year-old Gambia winger Yankuba Minteh to Brighton for £33m on Saturday, Newcastle, who could also sell the former England striker Callum Wilson to a Saudi Arabian pro-Leagbue club, have ensured they remain on the right sided of the Premier League’s Profitability and Sustainability rules (PSR).

Newcastle negotiated to take Forest’s reserve goalkeeper Odysseas Vlachodimos to St James’ Park as a makeweight in the deal for Anderson. The 30-year-old Greek international’s impending arrival suggests Martin Dubravka, Eddie Howe’s second-choice keeper, will depart Tyneside later this summer. Vlachodimos is Greece’s current first-choice and has been capped 42 by his country. He made nine appearances for Forest last season, conceding 19 goals.

Anderson, a former Newcastle youth captain, did not want to leave his boyhood club but it is believed he has been offered a near 50% increase in wages at the City Ground. Despite Howe’s reluctance to part with a gifted and versatile midfielder, Anderson’s impending departure almost certainly ensures that the Saudi Arabian-owned club can retain their much-covered leading players this summer, namely Alexander Isak, Bruno Guimarães and Anthony Gordon.

Son Heung-min has confirmed Rodrigo Bentancur has apologised for making a racist joke about him during a television interview in Uruguay, saying his Tottenham teammate had “made a mistake”.

The anti-discrimination charity Kick It Out said on Wednesday it had received a “significant number” of complaints regarding Bentancur’s comments, in which the midfielder appeared to say that South Korean people “all look the same”. Spurs said that they have been “providing assistance” to ensure that the 26-year-old Uruguayan is educated along with the rest of the squad in the club’s diversity, equality and inclusion objectives.

“We fully support that our captain Sonny feels that he can draw a line under the incident and that the team can focus on the new season ahead,” the club posted on X. “We are extremely proud of our diverse, global fanbase and playing squads. Discrimination of any kind has no place at our club, within our game or within wider society.”

Son said: “I’ve spoken with Lolo [Bentancur]. He made a mistake, he knows this and has apologised. Lolo would not mean to ever intentionally say something offensive. We are brothers and nothing has changed at all. We’re past this, we’re united, and we will be back together in pre-season to fight for our club as one.”

Bentancur previously posted: “Sonny brother! I apologise to you for what happened, it was just a very bad joke.”

West Ham are mulling over whether to push ahead with a move for the former Tottenham left-back Ryan Sessegnon on a free transfer.

Sessegnon, a free agent after being released by Spurs, is looking for a new opportunity after a difficult spell with injuries. Fulham are interested in a reunion with the 24-year-old and there has also been initial contact from the Hammers.

Julen Lopetegui, West Ham’s new head coach, is keen to bring in competition for Emerson Palmieri at left-back. Aaron Cresswell, Emerson’s deputy, was a bit-part player last season and there is a view that Sessegnon could be a bargain.

Sessegnon, who is also capable of playing as a wing-back or left winger, was rated as one of the best young players in England when he left Fulham for Spurs in 2019. But he struggled to settle at Tottenham, in part because of fitness problems. Sessegnon made 38 league appearances in his five years at Spurs and featured in only one game after hamstring surgery last season.

West Ham would need to be convinced that Sessegnon, who played a role in Spurs qualifying for the Champions League under Antonio Conte in 2022, would be over his injury problems. Signing him would boost West Ham’s homegrown quota.

The Tottenham midfielder Rodrigo Bentancur has apologised to his teammate Son Heung-min after appearing to say that South Korean people “all look the same” on a TV programme in Uruguay.

In a short clip from Por La Camiseta, host Rafa Cotelo asks the Uruguay international for a Spurs player’s shirt. “Sonny’s?” replies Bentancur, before adding: “It could be Sonny’s cousin too … they all look the same.”

Bentancur’s remark quickly drew widespread condemnation after the clip was posted online earlier this week. The 26-year-old has now reached out on social media to apologise to his club captain for what he has called “a bad joke”.

“Sony [sic] brother! I apologise to you for what happened, it was just a very bad joke!” Bentancur wrote on his Instagram stories. “You know I love you and I would never disrespect you or hurt you or anyone else! I love you brother!”

Son, who played 90 minutes for South Korea as they beat China 1-0 in a World Cup qualifier in Seoul on Tuesday, has yet to respond publicly.