Tottenham have been warned they may live to regret selling Will Lankshear this summer.
Middlesbrough signed the 21-year-old striker in a deal that could rise to £20m (£10m initially, with up to £10m in add-ons).
Lankshear spent last season on loan at Oxford in the Championship, scoring 11 goals in 44 games.
He has long been touted as an exciting youth prospect at Spurs, having joined from Sheffield United in 2022.
The England youth international scored 23 goals for the Under-21 side that won the 2023-24 Premier League 2 title, and he was named the competition’s Player of the Season.
“I feel like now is the best time in my career and I’m ready to hit the ground running and help this club,” Lankshear told the Boro website.
“Middlesbrough is such a massive club over the years. I deem it to be a Premier League club.
“The project here really excites me. I can’t wait to get started and be part of the journey, and get this club back where it belongs.”
Tottenham forward options
Goals at both ends of the pitch were a big problem for Spurs last season.
In the Premier League, they scored 48 but conceded 57 with Richarlison their top scorer on just 11.
Manager Roberto De Zerbi has splashed out around £237m, signing the likes of Sandro Tonali, Mateus Fernandes and Jan-Paul van Hecke.
However, little has been done to address their problems at the top end of the pitch.
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De Zerbi has teased a transfer ‘bomba’ still this summer, which could be a new forward player.
The club’s options were a topic of discussion on the latest episode of Inside Spurs.
The panel were not happy that the only two striking options at the moment were Dominic Solanke and Richarlison.
Spurs fan and broadcaster Abbi Summers said: “We cannot go into this season with our striking options being Solanke and Richarlison.
“They’re both so injury-prone and that can’t be it for the level Spurs need to be at.”
talkSPORT’s Sonny Snelling argued that Lankshear should have stayed to be back-up to a new, big-name striker.
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He said: “We haven’t seen Richarlison be fit or consistent. We haven’t seen Solanke be fit or consistent.
“I think Solanke is the better of the two players and what I see is both players have attributes that De Zerbi would like, but both of them have negatives as well that De Zerbi won’t like.
“I think the forward line is a bit of a mess anyway, because we’re in a situation where ideally you go into a transfer window trying to improve your squad.
“If we’re buying a player who doesn’t really take that attacking line to the next level, I don’t really see the point.
“But then you’ve got Mikey Moore still there. You’ve got Tel. You’ve got Odobert to come back from injury. You’ve got Kulusevski to come back from injury.
“Even if you bring the 10s, you’ve got Maddison who’s still coming back. You’ve got Xavi Simons to come back. You’ve got Kudus to come back. How do they all fit in?
“You can’t shift those injured players. So what you’re doing is you’re bringing in another forward, and then you’ve got a whole issue of who do you loan out?
“I know we’ve got a good fee for Will Lankshear, but I would have kept him and promoted him to the second-choice striker and got rid of Solanke and Richarlison and then got a stellar striker on top of that.”
Tottenham begin their Premier League season on August 22 with a trip to Brentford.
