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Tanner Tessmann joins Ligue 1’s Lyon in permanent deal

American midfielder Tanner Tessmann is officially on his way to Ligue 1.

Lyon has acquired Tessmann in a permanent deal from Serie A side Venezia, the club announced Tuesday. Tessmann has signed a five-year deal with the Ligue 1 side, which will run through the 2028-29 season.

Venezia will receive roughly €6 million for Tessmann’s services.

A former FC Dallas academy player, Tessmann was a key part of Venezia’s promotion back to Serie A last season through the promotion playoffs. Tessmann scored seven goals and added three assists in 42 combined appearances, eventually earning his spot on the U.S. Men’s Olympic Team this summer.

He featured in all four of the USMNT’s matches in Paris, France this summer.

In total, Tessmann has made 143 combined appearances at club level, with 99 of those coming at Venezia.

Tessmann originally looked set to join Inter Milan earlier this summer from Venezia, but a loan destination couldn’t be agreed upon for the 2024-25 campaign. Fiorentina and Torino also expressed interest in Tessmann over recent weeks, but Lyon won the race for his signature.

Lyon suffered back-to-back league defeats to begin the new season and next hosts Strasbourg on Friday on Matchday 3.

Comments

  1. ummm, people talking about him improving his “shop window” or not landing in “loan hell” do realize that if he had done nothing, venezia was happy and promoted, and he would have been playing in serie A, right? and that “loan hell” was possible in the departure scenario to inter milan, not staying put?

    in reality what happened here is he got greedy but couldn’t quite get the “buy me then loan me” weirdness sorted, burned his bridge backwards, and off to ligue 1 with a team that doesn’t know him instead of serie A with american owners and a team that liked him.

    and he’s managed to do this right when people were chatting his name up for the main NT off the olympics.

    we shall see.

    Reply
    • IV-

      He was only making 210K a year at Venezia. Busio was making $2.5 million.

      I might have burned that bridge too, especially if Venezia wasn’t interested in negotiating in good faith.

      And if Tessmann is anything like his godfather, Dabo Swinney, if you play games with the guy or negotiate in bad faith, he’s gone. Dabo’s not just Old School, he’s Old Testament, and he says what he means, means what he says, he keeps to his word, and plays an almost boringly straight game…and expects whoever he’s dealing with to do the same, or it’s See Ya. And the Swinneys all sort of have the opposite of egos; they’re high-character, grounded, religious, conservative, and they show up – on time – they punch the clock, they work their butts off and rip their guts out to give you an honest day’s work. They’re…square, is probably the best description.

      Everything I’ve seen out of Tessmann indicates he’s cut from the same cloth. If Venezia alienated him, my guess would be they worked at it.

      Reply
    • If that was the case sure- but that doesn’t appear to have truly been an option. Venezia were eager to deal him- didn’t want to let him play out his contract and get no return/have him leave for free. They preferred to cash out now- sell him rather than give him a new contract and up his meager wage. They got bitter when they couldn’t dictate his future for their benefit- he couldn’t reach agreement with the places they wanted to send him to with little chance to play or go into loan purgatory. In the end it’s hard to argue with the results. No guarantees, but his chances at Lyon certainly look to be a better opportunity/career move than rotting on the bench at Aston Villa, or being loaned out by AC Milan.

      Reply
      • that’s not my memory. what i have read eusebio considered him someone difficult to replace with the same characteristics, and they wanted him back. he started the summer with the inter loan idea, which became x y z rumors. the rumors even included a loan back to venezia, which hints the opposite of what you are saying. after a summer of that they said he’s out. and he then sells.

        i think you have it backwards.

        and to me for all the chatting up of values here, is a deal not a deal? holding out is more capitalist values than family or religious ones, sorry. when aiyuk has a year left and holds out on the 49ers for an extension, i don’t think he’s doing god’s work?

        also whether i like him or not, busio was a KC regular making NT B appearances when he moved. tessmann remains an age group guy. to be fair, tessmann had progressed into a role, and probably should have been given a better deal. but to me it’s weird all these things seem to happen with a year left with all this odd talk of how they don’t have options, where if he leaves next year, he can go anywhere. ask reyna, these deals seem to end up more crippling than helpful. it’s more like you thought you had leverage and didn’t, and then what?

      • “which hints the opposite of what you are saying.”

        Actually the deal w/ AC Milan signing him/loan back reinforces what I said. Venezia would get to deal him and keep his services without his contract running out.

        What they did not want was him simply staying/playing out his contract.

    • Our CM/DM pool is be coming the strength of the team. We also have 3 strong candidates for CAM: Pulisic, Tillman, Reyna. Obviously all three can play multiple attacking positions. With both Brendo and Pax looking strong to the start of the season and Cowells continued progression. The wing is getting deeper. Add in Yow and obviously Weah and Wright and now competition is starting to take shape.

      Reply
      • 2tone

        “Our CM/DM pool is be coming the strength of the team.”

        Please don’t confuse quality with quantity.

        The fact that we have so many candidates indicates that people are not happy with the incumbent/incumbents.

        So far none of the hopefuls have proven a thing yet.

  2. Good job, good level, good club, and a permanent deal so he’s not in perpetual Loan Hell.

    Still think he might wind up a 5/6 ‘tweener before it’s all said and done, but I’ve always thought this guy was a future starter for us in some capacity.

    I’m a big fan of incremental moves and not blind jumps into the deep end and this is one. Ligue 1 is the bottom of the Big-5 leagues but it’s absolutely a shop window into the others in a way even the EFL Championship isn’t. I think Tessmann’s biggest issue is going to be winning a starting gig on a club this big – which assuredly isn’t going to be easy – but if he does do that he should be highly effective in Ligue 1, since aside from the top four teams the rest are all in MLS ranges in terms of salary.

    Reply

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