“Would take a massive offer” – £45m claim made as Spurs eye Middlesbrough duo…

FLW’s Middlesbrough fan pundit Phil Spencer believes Tottenham may have to bid up to £45 million to convince Boro to sell van den Berg and Hackney this summer, predicting that the former could be valued between £15-20 million and the latter around £20-25 million.

“I’m not surprised at all that both of them are attracting interest,” Phil said.

“Van den Berg arrived at Middlesbrough last summer, and he was expected to be a bit of a development signing, but because of the injury crisis at the club, he was given an opportunity early on and just really showed his quality and maturity in those early performances.

“He played at left-back, he played at right-back, although he’s naturally a central defender, and over the course of the campaign he became one of the most important players under Michael Carrick in a pretty disjointed season.

“In my opinion, Rav van den Berg is a player who will be playing in the Champions League at some point in the future.

“He’s got that sheer quality about him in terms of his technical play, but also in terms of his mindset.

“I think his maturity is one of the key things that he’s got in his armoury, and that leadership from a young age to boss people around who are older than him and more experienced.

“It’s a real natural quality that he’s got, and it’s something that will serve him well in the future.

“As for Hayden Hackney, I think it seemed inevitable that he was going to move on this summer.

“Clubs in the Premier League have been circling around him for a little while, and I think that fact he has jumped up to England U21s, he’d previously been playing for Scotland, is a sheer testament to his quality.

“This season has been a bit of disjointed one because of injury, in my personal opinion, had he stayed fit for the whole season, it would have been a dead cert that he would move on this summer.

“I think the fact that he hasn’t stayed fully fit this season means Middlesbrough have maybe got a little bit more time with him, and it will be interesting to see if any summer interest does come in.

“Tottenham are a club who do like to invest in young talent, I think that will be a way that they go, but I’m not entirely sure that these two deals will come off because Middlesbrough will drive a really hard bargain on both of them.

“The club will sell players at the right price, part of their business model is based around signing young talent, developing it and potentially selling it on for a profit.

“But what Middlesbrough have done really well in the last few transfer windows is they’ve already sold on a number of players when you look at Morgan Rogers in January, Chuba Akpom previous to that, you’ve got people like Djed Spence and Marcus Tavenier as well, so there’s no pressure for Middlesbrough to sell either of these two players.

“If the price is right and Tottenham came in with a big money offer, both deals could potentially get done, but in my opinion, it would take a massive offer for both of these signings to happen.

“If you were making me put a figure on both of them, I think for Hayden Hackney you’d be looking somewhere between £20-25 million to attract his services.

“Rav van den Berg is probably slightly less than that at the moment, I think you’d be looking for maybe £15-20 million to give Middlesbrough something to think about.

“But such is the ceiling of van den Berg, I think he is someone that could be worth £30 million plus in the seasons to come, although I do appreciate that there is a bit of a cap on the kind of asking prices that Championship clubs do tend to ask.

“I think both of these players will attract top dollar, and as far as Middlesbrough are concerned, it would take that kind of huge offer for them to even consider selling either of these two players, such is the importance of them in Middlesbrough’s plans moving forward.”

Middlesbrough must hold firm on Rav van den Berg and Hayden Hackney this summer