Cristian Romero bids farewell to Tottenham as £34.2m Atletico Madrid move nears completion
Cristian Romero is set to complete a transfer to Atletico Madrid after the Spanish club agreed to pay Tottenham Hotspur £34.2m for the 28-year-old defender, bringing his five-year stay in north London to a close.
Romero confirmed his departure in a farewell message posted on his X account, writing: "The journey wasn't perfect, but I don't want that to define my goodbye. I choose to remember the happy moments, the lessons, the people who…" He said he always gave everything and defended the Tottenham shirt with pride, while acknowledging he "wasn't perfect" during his time at the club (BBC Sport).
It is a parting tinged with physical pain as much as sentiment. Romero's last appearance for Spurs came against Sunderland in April, when he left the field in tears with a knee injury that ruled him out of the club's final six Premier League matches. A defender who built his reputation on aggression and commitment, he was unable to give his Tottenham career the ending on the pitch that he might have wanted.
Romero joined Tottenham from Atalanta in 2021 and went on to make 156 appearances. The high point arrived in May 2025, when he helped Spurs win the Europa League — beating Manchester United in the final to secure the club's first trophy in 17 years. For a generation of Tottenham supporters who had waited since 2008 for silverware, Romero was part of the team that finally delivered.
His move to Atletico Madrid had been gathering momentum through the summer. As of June, Romero had two years remaining on his Tottenham contract, a factor that made a switch to the Spanish capital appealing from his perspective. Atletico, managed by Diego Simeone, have long favoured the kind of combative, no-nonsense defending that defines Romero's game — a centre-back who relishes the physical contest and treats every duel as personal.
For Tottenham, the fee represents a return on a player who arrived from Atalanta for an initial £42.5m and delivered the one thing the club had craved for nearly two decades: a trophy. The timing, though, is delicate. Spurs lose a cornerstone of their defence with the new season already underway, and the burden of replacing a player of Romero's intensity falls on a back line that struggled in his absence during the final weeks of the last campaign.
For fans, this means saying goodbye to a player who wore his heart on his sleeve — sometimes to a fault, never through indifference. His farewell message made peace with imperfection. Tottenham supporters, now processing his departure, may feel the same way about his time at the club: flawed at moments, unforgettable at its best.
