How I’d love to be a fly on the wall on transfer deadline at Tottenham; to experience first hand the famed negotiating skills of Daniel Levy.
The Spurs chairman was particularly busy on the final day of the summer window in 2011, when no fewer than six players left White Hart Lane.
Peter Crouch was one of those half-dozen; although wouldn’t have been had he had things his way. The towering striker recalled on his podcast, with Special Guest Harry Redknapp, who of course was Spurs manager at the time, how he played hard-ball with Levy to agree to leave for Stoke City.
Here’s a transcript of their conversation:
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Peter Crouch: “I wanted to stay. We had the conversation in the office, me, you and Daniel Levy on the loudspeaker.”
Harry Redknapp: “Daniel came in, he wanted the money, he wanted to sell Pete, and that’s it. And what a career Pete had a Stoke as well.”
Crouch: “I remember Daniel telling me Adebayor was coming in and I get it. He was trying to balance the books. He had a great offer of £10 million from Stoke and they were going to take Wilson Palacios as well. So, it was obviously a great deal.
“I was digging my heels in a little bit and Daniel wasn’t pleased with that because it was deadline day. But it all worked out in the end. It was good.”
Redknapp: “He gave you what you wanted in the end, I suppose, he had to didn’t he (says laughing). You had him by the n**s.
Crouch: “I had all the cards. They weren’t going to take Wilson were they unless I went. I said ‘Wilson’s got a dodgy knee and I’m pushing 30 now’.
“So I just said ‘I’ll see you in the morning. I’m happy here. He was ringing me all day, all day. But we got there in the end.”
It’s hard to know who got the better of things here. Levy got what he wanted; Crouch out of the door and Adebayor in, but the former England striker went to Staffordshire with a big cheque in his pocket, by the sounds of it.