Olympique Marseille's Belgium international striker Michy Batshuayi has been heavily linked with a move to Tottenham Hotspur this summer, per the Sun's Sunni Upal.In fact,Spurs' apparent interestgoes back over a year, according to Darren Lewis of the Mirror.Batshuayi has since enjoyed a prolific Ligue 1 season, scoring 17 goals and assisting nine more as OM limped to a 13th-place finish.With no European football next season, Marseille need to produce funds and Batshuayi is among their most marketable assets.There are financial problems at the club that have become particularly pressing with Le Parisien (viagetfootballnewsfrance.com) reporting in recent daysthat they must pay 25 million to avoid a potential transfer embargo.Crystal Palace have surprisingly emerged as a rival for Batshuayi's signature, according to the Guardian, but Tottenham would remain favourites if they match the Eagles' reported 38 million bid.Given their ability to offer Champions League football and a higher quality of facilities, team-mate and manager, it is hard to imagine Batshuayi opting for south rather than north London.If Spurs do sign Batshuayi, the question of where and how he would be used emerges.Certainly, Tottenham are not looking for a replacement for Harry Kane but rather a strike partner to help share the goalscoring burden.Last season Kane started every one of Spurs' 38 Premier League games as a lone forward.When Clinton Njie was fit in the early part of the campaign, Pochettino experimented with introducing the Cameroonian later in games in order to stretch the opposition's defence and allow Kane to drop into a deeper position.The primary tactical benefit of signing Batshuayi would be the added flexibility that he would bring to Pochettino's squad.While Njie is an unrefined and as yet unremarkable player, Batshuayi is something nearer the finished article and could be expected to play that same role from the opening day.His presence would liberate Kane to play a deeper role and take greater control in the build-up play.Given his primary role as a No. 9, Kane possesses exceptional creative abilities, and Batshuayi's presence would liberate him to express those more often. He could take up a nominal No. 10 position and drift forward or into wide areas as the game dictated.Batshuayi was played exclusively as a centre-forward last season for Marseille and would demand a similar role at Spurs, but he is a very different kind of striker to Kane.He typically attempts to isolate one of the opposition defenders and run onto passes played through the back line into space.His pace is explosive, but he rarely outruns defenders over long distances, preferring to sprint into space close to goal and shoot quickly.Each of his 17 Ligue 1 goals came from inside the box.He shoots on the turn as well as any player in Europe, and that quality would be happily exploited by Spurs' creative players like Christian Eriksen, Eric Dier and Erik Lamela.The presence of a willing runner would necessitate close attention from opposing defenders and free up space around Kane. That can only be a good thing.Signing Batshuayi would also give Pochettino the option of making a genuine formation switch away from his preferred 4-2-3-1 (this is open to some interpretation) to deploy two forwards.This is unlikely to appeal to the dogmatic Argentinian except in special circumstances, but having the option would make Tottenham a more dangerous team.The acquisition of a forward with complementary rather than comparative qualities to Kane is clearly a priority given Spurs' most keenly pursued transfer targets.The club's breathless pursuit of Saido Berahino last summer and the eventual signing of Njie suggest as much.There is no question that the signing of such a player would improve Tottenham's options in attack, their flexibility and their squad depth.The true question is whether or not Batshuayi is the right option.He scored with 16 percent of his shots or roughly one goal per 6-7 attempts last season. This rate was comparable with Kane's.It must count against Batshuayi that he has been the beneficiary of the relatively poor marking that can be found in France's top flight. He would not be given nearly the space that he enjoys there if he were to join the Premier League.He is not a particularly gifted player, but the divergence between his skill set and Kane's could make for a prolific partnership.If no player of comparable qualities can be found for anything less than the significant transfer fee being demanded by Marseille, Spurs could move for Batshuayi with relative confidence that he would make them a better side.
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