Tottenham Hotspur will face competition from Italian clubs for Aston Villa striker Christian Benteke in the summer. The Belgium international, who has just been ruled out of the World Cup with an achilles injury, will have his pick of clubs when the season finishes.
The powerhouse, who joined Villa from Genk for 7m, put in an official transfer request last summer, but then withdrew it and instead signed a new four-year contract. Benteke had been seen at Tottenham’s training ground ahead of a proposed move – with the north Londoners’ chairman Daniel Levy set to pursue the star this summer.
Milan and Juventus had already been linked with a swoop, but Roma have now joined the fray.
Aston Villa would rather sell their top player abroad than to another Premier League side, but the 20m price-tag could prove an issue. Benteke had re-found his goalscoring form from last season having endured a run of 12 games without a goal earlier in the campaign with six goals in his last 11 appearances. Watch Chelsea v Stoke on Saturday and Arsenal v Everton, West Ham v Liverpool on Sunday.
