Thats not the reason why he didn’t join though. He didn’t want to come and play in the under 23s, he wanted league football. I suspect he will join an EFL club.
I strongly suspect that's BS (yes I've seen the tweets from his manager at Lewes) but he's turning down a lotto ticket, even if it doesn't work out at Spurs, which is highly likely, just being on Spurs books would open doors for him at other EFL Clubs + he would have earned enough money to set him up for life (buy a modest house outright) etc...
I'm guessing here of course, I've never heard of him before now so nothing to base my assumption on other than what has preceded before in the history of the game when a Pro Football Club comes knocking you take it, let alone a top 6 PL Team! If he doesn't join Brighton, who were apparently also looking to bring him in then I'm more than happy to revise my thoughts, as at least it would be consistent with his thought process here.