Tottenham have suffered a major blow in terms of their ability to compete with Man United in the transfer market. While Spurs’ profile is growing exponentially overseas, they are still very much the junior partner in the so-called Big Six in terms of their global brand. Despite a dearth of major success on the pitch, United are at the other end of the spectrum – one statistic routinely pushed by the club’s marketing department is that they have a billion fans worldwide. That figure has been questioned by many commentators, who suggest that it uses a rather loose definition of ‘fan’. But there …