Match of the Day’s Gary Lineker reacts to Tottenham signing Brighton’s Yves Bissouma

Tottenham are closing in on the highly-rated Malian midfielder Yves Bissouma after reportedly agreeing a £25million deal with the Seagulls.

The 25-year-old has been at Brighton for the last four seasons and it has become inevitable that he was going to move to a bigger club after consistently excelling.

The deal will be the third signing the Lillywhites have concluded following the arrival of Fraser Forster, free from Southampton, and Ivan Perisic, from Italian giants Inter Milan.

In what is expected to be a summer of intent with the backing of Italian manager Antonio Conte, the arrival of Bissouma is a massive boost to Spurs, who knew rivals Arsenal were also linked.

How Gary Lineker reacted to Spurs’ new signing

Writing on Twitter, Lineker, a former Tottenham striker himself, said: “This would be an excellent signing.”

Bissouma was first signed by Brighton in 2018 by then manager Chris Hughton and even though he took a while to get going, it became clear that he was a jewel by the time Graham Potter walked through the door.

Since then he has been monitored by some of the big teams in Europe and last summer, Liverpool were reported to have looked at him closely.

In January, Aston Villa had an offer for him turned down by both the player and the club as they looked for bigger offers.

That big fish arrived in the form of Tottenham and with the player left with just one year on his contract, Brighton decided to cash in with a £25million deal.

The Seagulls already feel that they are well equipped to cope with Bissouma’s departure having already signed Enock Mwepu and Moisés Caicedo to deal with the transition.