Shakhtar Donetsk chief accuses Tottenham of taking advantage of the war in Ukraine to sign Manor Solomon for free, as he claims the Premier League club behaved ‘like a robber on the road’

Tottenham are accused of taking advantage of the war in Ukraine last year to release winger Manor Solomon.

Solomon was contracted to Shakhtar Donetsk until the end of 2023, but FIFA allowed non-Ukrainian nationals to suspend their contracts following the Russian invasion, and Spurs stepped in to sign the Israeli international last July.

Shakhtar chief executive Serhiy Palkin is furious at the turn of events after his club had to pay £5.1 million to buy Solomon in 2019, only to receive nothing in return four years later, and lashed out at Tottenham’s behaviour.

“I have a very bad feeling about Tottenham,” Palkin said The Telegraph. ‘I can’t believe that these kinds of clubs with a huge history – not only at European level, but also at world level – can behave like this.

“From my point of view, it’s not acceptable behavior. They took advantage of the war.

Tottenham did not have to pay compensation because his contract was suspended during the war in Ukraine

Shakhtar’s CEO Serhiy Palkin (pictured) thinks Spurs behaved ‘like a robber on the road’

‘It is very strange that everyone says that we are one football family, while one of the top clubs receives a player for free and the market value of this player reaches 25 million euros. We invested in this player and developed this player for this kind of value.

I even said to Tottenham: “Guys, I don’t need money for him now. Let’s have some kind of sell-on fee of 30 to 40 percent in the future. That would be enough for us.” But they said, “No, no, we can’t give you that. We’ll give you 10 percent.” I said, “Guys, that’s not serious.” Giving us 10 percent is not respectful. You don’t act like the football family. You act like a robber on the road. It’s not correct. Therefore, at this time we will see the next steps.”

Palkin hinted that Shakhtar could take legal action against Tottenham, suggesting the Premier League club had acted immorally.

“We have two sides, a legal side and a moral side,” Palin continued. ‘The court decides on the legal side. On the moral side, when I spoke to Tottenham, I spoke about the moral part of this matter.

Solomon has not played for Tottenham since September due to a serious knee injury

‘We have a number of players, Vinicius Tobias at Real Madrid and Maycon at Corinthians. Those clubs wanted to take our players, but they came to us and said, “Okay, we can take them for free, but we don’t want to play these dirty games.”

“Instead, they offered to pay us for loans. Real Madrid took our player and paid us for two years. Corinthians did the same. Do you see the difference between Real Madrid and Tottenham? The management of Real Madrid has behaved and how has Tottenham behaved?’

Solomon played in five of Tottenham’s first seven league games last season but has not featured since September after suffering a serious knee injury.