Nuno Espirito Santo asks Spurs to pursue Wolves captain Conor Coady

Tottenham head coach Nuno Espirito Santo has asked his new club to reunite him with Wolves centre-back Conor Coady this summer, believing the England international to be an ideal signing.

Spurs want to sign at least one new centre-back this summer, but ideally two, and have already been looking at Bologna’s Takehiro Tomiyasu, Lyon’s Joachim Andersen and Burnley’s James Tarkowski in that respect.

But Nuno worked with Coady for four years at Molineux and grew very close with the former Liverpool academy player. Together they enjoyed promotion to the Premier League in 2018 and consecutive seventh place finishes in 2019 and 2020.

Coady, who is currently part of England’s squad at Euro 2020, signed a new long-term contract with Wolves less than a year ago and 90min understands that the defender is more than happy at Molineux. However, the prospect of taking a step up to join one of the Premier League’s big six clubs would be difficult for him to turn down.

The Wolves hierarchy has already informed Nuno’s replacement, Bruno Lage, that the club is not in a position to reject any substantial offers for their star players this summer – that includes Coady alongside the likes of Ruben Neves and Adama Traore.

Neves has been linked with Manchester United and Arsenal and would be sold if an asking price in excess of £30m is met, while Traore continues to attract interest from Leeds.

Chinese owners Fosun are restructuring their commitment and involvement with Wolves and it will take player sales to raise a transfer budget in order to equip Lage with fresh faces in the squad.

The club’s financial records show that Wolves made pre-tax losses between £20m and £55m in three out of four seasons between 2016 and 2020. With the impact of the coronavirus pandemic still being felt, that is likely to become four out of five by the time the 2020/21 accounts are finalised.

Super agent Jorge Mendes is very close with both Nuno and Lage and if there is a deal to be done regarding Coady then the Portuguese tycoon would be well placed to facilitate it.

Wolves are looking for defensive reinforcements this summer themselves and, like Spurs, Burnley’s Tarkowski is a player they are interested in.

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