He was a completely different player in his 2 years with Lyon prior to signing with us.
I remember watching him against Barcelona and Manchester City and thinking there’s absolutely no chance we’re going to get this guy. He played their midfields off the park.
Along with Frenkie de Jong, he was THE top young midfielder in Europe that summer. There genuinely was a host of top clubs after him, including Juve and Real Madrid.
There were murmurings of a poor attitude from very early on in his career but everyone seemed to believe they were a thing of the past, including our scouts and Pochettino.
Even from very early on in pre season though you could see there we something very off. He didn’t look as strong or sharp as he did at Lyon, and he was literally blowing out of his arse after one or two sprints.
In hindsight, we probably shouldn’t have made him the joint highest player along with Kane in order to get him to sign, as it clearly made his head swell enormously.
However, I will never criticize the club for signing Ndombele. He was at the time a player in demand from the best clubs in the world and we finally acted like the big club we are, went out, put our balls on the table and got him in early doors.
The issue is, the fact that he didn’t work out seems to have burnt Levy and ENIC to the point that they are no longer willing to even consider going after a player at that level of the market again, which is ultimately going to prevent us from competing at the top end of the table.