‘Arry’s game

backfired.

Making ultimatums to Daniel Levy, touting yourself around anywhere, everywhere behind Levy’s back, making no secret he’d have jumped ship if the F.A. had even looked at him – did he turn down a contract extension when Fabio resigned from England? – slagging off the fans.

It might have worked, contrary to what ‘Arry said hanging out his car window, for Levy to keep him on. Pissing away that lead, losing third spot and therefore Champions League football next season after Cheatski’s final victory and losing so miserably to said scumbag outfit in the Cup semi, made sure it didn’t.

Yes Levy wanted rid, many of us did. But don’t blow the end of that season in the way ‘Arry managed and you can see it not happening.

As I said a few posts back during his stint on the BBC for the Euros whenever the boy Lineker mentioned the club old ‘Arry’s face sagged even more than you’d imagine is possible. He knew it was over. He just knew Levy was going to play hardball, would he walk or will he have to be pushed. Te death of Levy’s mother played a part in the timing but I do feel that Levy waited until the Cheatski job had been given to Di Matteo before saying enough’s enough, he was fed up dealing with a two faced, two timing, tart.

His media chums are of course up in arms, where will they get reddy quotes, from someone hanging out a car window outside training grounds now? Of course they won’t be honest about why things soured and hypocrite that is jovial genial ‘Arry.

Even when he contradicts himself to them. Back at the end of March when everyone was using the England job as excuse for the club’s poor run, ‘Arry was stating…

Absolute nonsense, that is the biggest load of nonsense I’ve ever heard in my life.
The players don’t care whether I’m the manager next year.

The players wouldn’t lose any sleep over that. That’s football. Footballers are footballers. They play the game, they come in every day and train, somebody else walks in here tomorrow, the king is dead long live the king.
They don’t worry ‘Harry’s going to England’ or ‘he’s going to go somewhere else’. They don’t think about that, I don’t think about it. ‘Arry Redknapp

Yet when it comes to his contract negotiations a few days ago he’s saying…

If they don’t extend it and I go into my last year, it’s not an easy one when players know you’ve only got a year left.
It’s not a case of me looking for security. What it’s about is players knowing you’ve only got one year left on your contract and knowing that it doesn’t work, basically. I think it’s a situation of ‘well, he might not be here next year’. ‘Arry Redknapp

He’s hanging out the car window today saying the fans are great, little over a year ago they, we, were all idiots.

This time last season ‘Arry was contradicting the club and chairman over the sale of Modric, ‘Arry wanted the money to spend on the likes of Anton Ferdinand and Phil Neville, Levy wanted to keep our best midfielder. This time he’s saying the club would be finished if it sold it’s best players. Oh, he brought Bale through and made him a wanted player. Well no. He was ready to dump Bale off for a few quid to Forest up until Assou-Ekotto picked up an injury and his hand was forced. Then when finding Bale was the best left winger about he was happy to let the Welshman wander all over the place, which bizarrely coincided with the loss of team form.

Look at another situation where his hand was forced, Sandro. ‘Arry never played him, didn’t seem to want him until he had nothing left and the Brazilian was his only choice in the Champions League. He performed brilliantly, looking like the quality player he is. But then straight away he was sidelined as ‘Arry brought in Parker and again Sandro didn’t get a look in until injuries took over, where Sandro put in performances far better than anything Parker had done. But that’s ‘Arry, happy to waste and then possibly lose the talents of a young, foreign, player for a far inferior English one.

His one real success on the player front at Spurs, buying and bringing through, is Kaboul. But then in a recent French interview the player stated that at his former French club he was trained unlike at his current one. Yes he got something out of Adebayor but I feel he’s just playing for a contract and things’ll be different.

And OK the arm round the shoulder trick did work for Assou-Ekotto but surely something more than that and just facking run around a bit are required.

He did the job required when hired, I was quite happy for his appointment, got the side out of the relegation mire Levy’s latest brainstorm had got them into – though of course Juande walked away having won a trophy, unlike ‘Arry’s final and two semi-final losses which brought no silverware. Then he was in charge through two 4th places and a fifth. But then he’s had the best group of players at the club since the 80s. Martin Jol got close to Levy’s holy grail of top four with an inferior group.

And while Martin left with tears in the eyes and his name ringing around The Lane, ‘Arry leaves with a range from meh to good riddance. Yes some are saying it’s the wrong thing to do but it’s done, time to move on, ‘Arry wasn’t Spurs, we were just a stepping stone for him. Will he find as good a job, there wasn’t many big teams after him before, what chance many will look at him now.

And who does Levy have an eye on for the job? Moyes, Martinez, Capello, Benitez, Deschamps, AVB, Bilic?

Shame the plug wasn’t pulled last year, Ancelotti would have been ideal, of the above why would anyone want Pugwash (Benitez), or Capello. Moyes and Martinez, it’s a bit underwhelming. The latter tries to get his team to play nice football and who knows what he can do with better players. The former, more pragmatic, but again is that due to what he’s had to play with. Also he did sign Phil Neville but again he’s somewhat restricted cash wise.

AVB will have the media after him as they were at Cheatski, like Gross at Spurs they wouldn’t want him to succeed and would be undermining him from the off. Again he would have a better group of players to work with and wouldn’t have the added hassle of the owner wanting him do phase out the old guard while playing good football and still winning.

Had a sneaky feeling for Bilic, before he took the job in Russia, figured would help keep Modric on board. I wonder about Jürgen, would he leave the easy confines of the US or even his former number two with Germany, now number one Joachim Löw.

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