James Maddison is set to join Tottenham for £40m (Photo: Getty)
Incoming Tottenham signing James Maddison has deleted old tweets where he said he ‘disliked’ the club and ‘hated’ legendary star Gareth Bale.
Spurs have won the race to sign the Leicester star ahead of Newcastle, with Maddison set to join in a transfer worth £40million.
In order to sweeten the deal, the Lilywhites are also selling Harry Winks to the Foxes for £10m.
It’s a huge coup for Tottenham as Maddison has long been considered one of the Premier League’s best players outside of the ‘big six’, with the attacking midfielder recording 10 goals and nine assists last season despite suffering relegation.
But as fans eagerly await his arrival in north London, a few eagle-eyed supporters have noted that the 26-year-old has recently deleted some of his social media posts mocking his new club.
‘I hate Gareth Bale with a passion, calm down you monkey, [Jack] Wilshere is 10x better than you chimpanzee,’ the England international tweeted in November 2012.
And in March 2013, he posted: ‘Hope Luis Suarez destroys Tottenham today, don’t like Spurs! Especially that monkey everyone’s on about!’
Maddison has deleted old tweets mocking his new club (Photo: Getty/Twitter)
Of course, these comments came over a decade ago when Maddison was a teenager and still over a year away from his senior debut for boyhood club Coventry.
They resurfaced when the links to Spurs began to gain traction, however tweets the player made prior to December 2019 are no longer visible.
Bale is considered one of Tottenham’s greatest ever players and in the season Maddison made his remarks the Welshman was named Player of the Year, before moving to Real Madrid for a then-word record fee of £85m.
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Now retired, the former forward won five Champions Leagues and has a rather larger trophy cabinet than Arsenal hero Wilshere.
Interestingly, in reference to the second tweet, Suarez did indeed score in Liverpool’s 3-2 win over Spurs in March 2013.
Maddison is set to become Ange Postecoglou’s second signing for the club following the arrival of goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario from Empoli.
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The Leicester star is set to move to north London.