Liverpool left Daniel Levy furious after gazumping Tottenham to sign Luis Diaz from Porto for a knock-down price, which their rivals ended up negotiating for them.
Diaz joined Liverpool on a five-year contract worth £90,000 per week last week after they agreed to pay Porto £37.5million up front and £12.5m in potential add-ons.
The 25-year-old winger is undoubtedly an exciting signing for Jurgen Klopp’s side – and they had to work hard to get the deal over the line.
Diaz was in high demand after contributing 16 goals and four assists in 26 appearances for Porto this season and had concrete interest from both Spurs and Barcelona.
Liverpool got wind of Tottenham ’s movements and a remarkable fresh report from The Athletic has revealed how they managed to push their Premier League rivals aside to land him.
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Spurs were first to enter negotiations with Porto and the Portuguese club had agreed to the move in writing, while Diaz had done so in principle and was understood to be excited to join Antonio Conte’s side.
But Liverpool, who were led by Julian Ward , took advantage of some confusion around the agents working on the deal to swoop in and lure Diaz to Merseyside.
Porto had reportedly given superagent Jorge Mendes a mandate to complete the move to Spurs – but his involvement annoyed Diaz’s own agent.
Liverpool were informed by their South American scout and took advantage of the disagreement to move in, without Mendes’ involvement, and sign the winger while he was away on international duty with Colombia.
Even more galling for Tottenham – and Spurs chairman Levy in particular – was the added detail around the transfer fee.
Liverpool had previously considered Diaz’ release clause of £66.8m (€80m) to be too steep, but were ‘delighted’ to discover Spurs had haggled Porto down to £37.5m with £12.5m in add-ons on their behalf.
Levy’s anger at missing out on the deal came in part because of Tottenham’s failures elsewhere to get transfers over the line.
Adama Traore had been a priority, but the Wolves winger decided to join Barcelona instead, while Dusan Vlahovic chose Juventus from Fiorentina and Robin Gosens went to Inter from Atalanta.
Levy was reportedly ‘furious’ with the way Liverpool conducted themselves and the previously cordial relationship between the two clubs could be ‘seriously damaged’.
Tottenham ended up signing Dejan Kulusevski and Rodrigo Bentancur from Juventus on transfer deadline day.
But those additions, which were negotiated by former Juve sporting director Fabio Paratici, only came after they missed out on other targets.
The Athletic names Manchester United ’s Jesse Lingard, AC Milan’s Franck Kessie, Roma’s Jordan Veretout and Barcelona’s Ousmane Dembele as players who were considered.
