Hugo Lloris confirms desire to leave Tottenham
By Tom Gott
Tottenham captain Hugo Lloris has admitted he hopes to leave the club this summer as he approaches the final 12 months of his contract.
Spurs are looking to recruit a new goalkeeper this summer, with Brentford's David Raya and Inter's Andre Onana among the names on their shortlist to replace the 36-year-old.
Lloris does still have one year remaining on his contract but he confirmed to Nice Matin that he hopes to find an agreement to leave Spurs this summer and bring his 11-year association with the club to an end.
"We are coming to an important moment, for the club or for me," he began. "It's the end of an era. I have desires for other things.
"I will ask myself to study what is possible, but I don't forget that I still have one year left on my contract with Tottenham and that, in football, it is always difficult to predict what will happen. What is essential at the moment is to recover well from my injury. I'm on holiday but I continue to talk and do my training.
"My goal is to recover in July, then we'll see what the future holds for me."
READ THE LATEST TOTTENHAM NEWS, TRANSFER RUMOURS & GOSSIP
feed
Asked about links with a possible move to Saudi Arabia, Lloris appeared to stress he believes he is good enough to remain in Europe.
"You can't go from a successful World Cup to being an average player in a few months," the goalkeeper insisted. "I had a few hard knocks, I was a little inconsistent in my performance, I got injured twice. I came out of the World Cup pretty dull. The pace had been hellish before that.
"This is the first time in my career that I am unavailable. But I'm good in my head, in my body. This period will bring me freshness to still make me happy with my performance, my work. The most important thing is to find a project in which I flourish."
Lloris made 31 appearances in all competitions for Tottenham this season, with injury problems adding to what was a frustrating campaign for everyone at the club.
"It's not what we hoped for as a team," the Frenchman conceded. "We made it halfway through the season rather well, in the Premier League and the Champions League. During the second part of the season, we experienced a lot of hard knocks on the collective level but also on the individual level with two injuries.
"We failed as a team by not being able to reverse the course of things. It's disappointing but it's part of the life of a top-level football club. The most important thing is to prepare as well as possible for next season and to learn from our mistakes."
LISTEN NOW
On this week's edition of Talking Transfers, part of the 90min podcast network, Scott Saunders is joined by Toby Cudworth and Graeme Bailey to discuss Harry Kane, Declan Rice, Jude Bellingham, Alexis Mac Allister, Karim Benzema, William Saliba & more!
If you can't see this embed, click here to listen to the podcast!