Lampard confirms Willian contract talks ongoing

Gorgeous Willian Borges may hate Tottenham, but apparently he also hates quick resolutions to contract extension sagas. He’s now just a week shy of being able to talk freely to other teams, and his new contract remains unsigned.

Following Sunday’s timely reminder of his excellence, Willian repeated his desire to stay. Now Lampard’s chimed in again, revealing that talks are still ongoing and hinting that the hang-up is over the financials.

“He’s in talks with the club [about a contract], he speaks with the club on the money side of it.

“[He’s been] Great for me, especially when he plays like he did the other day. It was an incredible performance. He has that talent.”

On the plus side, if they’re talking money, perhaps that means that the contract length — presumably just the single year extension as per club policy — has been agreed.

Willian has shown this season that despite everyone’s best intentions to play the youth, sometimes you still need some veteran consistency and leadership to get the results you desire. He may have a decade on the likes of Pulisic, Mount, and Hudson-Odoi, but that also means a decade more of experiences earned and challenges overcome. Combine that with Willian’s usual qualities and, at times, even some direct contributions to the scoreboard, and it becomes fairly obvious that keeping him around for at least one more season should be beneficial to the team (unlike, say, with Pedro).

“I knew he had that talent before I got the job. I think I have said this before, but the last year or two I have looked at him from afar and wasn’t sure how much he was enjoying it, whether he felt happy in games. A bit of body language, in and out sometimes.

“My feeling at the start of the season was to give him his head, tell him how much I feel about him and how I see him. Get him fit, get him working off the ball because I know he can, and the rest in terms of what he does on the ball I can kind of let him do that because he has this incredibly ability to burst away from people.”

“If there was one thing I wanted from him at the start of the season it was a question of can you score more goals, because your talent says that you should do. And that means sometimes running into space behind defenders, and getting the other side, etc, and he is doing all those things.

“And the experience helps when you have got a young team, when the other options are younger, experience certainly helps. All his teammates love him, low maintenance player to have in the squad, so yes I am really happy with him.”

-Frank Lampard; source: Mail

Well, sign him up!