da dobrowin： As England failed to overcome ten-man France in Paris last night, eventually leaving the capital on the wrong end of a 3-2 scoreline, explosive winger Ousmane Dembele was unquestionably the star of the show.
da doce： He began quietly but grew into the match as it went on and provided the moment of magic that put France ahead just before half time, stepping his way through the England defence and leaving John Stones for dead before producing a low drive at goal that eventually gave scorer Djibril Sidibe a simple rebound.
The seven-cap starlet later went on to grab his first international goal at senior level and what proved to be the winner, turning up at the right time on the counter-attack to drill the ball past Gary Cahill and Jack Butland into the bottom corner of the net.
It was nothing short of a Man of the Match performance from the 20-year-old, further enhancing his reputation as one of the most exciting young players in Europe after finishing 2016/17 with 10 goals and 18 assists across all competitions for Borussia Dortmund.
That must leave a sour taste in the mouths of Spurs fans, after their club reportedly snubbed the chance to sign Dembele for just £1.2million back in 2015. According to Squawka, Tottenham even confirmed their interest in the then-teenager and agreed to match Rennes’ asking price, but bizarrely asked him to travel to London for a one-week trial at his own expense.
Dembele and Rennes dismissed the notion and the prodigious winger has already gone on to claim a much greater transfer fee, moving to WestfalenStadion for £12.75million last summer. TransferMarkt now value him at £23.8million but Spurs would have to pay considerably more to convince Dortmund to sell this summer – they and the France national team have a genuine world-class prodigy on their hands.
Over the next few years, deciding not to take a punt on Dembele in 2015 could prove to be one of Tottenham’s biggest regrets in the transfer market.
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