The World According to Harry by Harry Redknapp

Author:Harry Redknapp
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781473571280
Publisher: Ebury Publishing

15

STREET SMARTS

‘You’ve got to be savvy to survive …’

Nowadays, if a player wants a transfer, he won’t talk to managers, he’ll talk to his agent, who will then talk to chairmen or chief executives. Managers at the highest level no longer have anything to do with transfer deals. But years ago, if you wanted to buy someone, you’d get on the phone to the player you fancied, bring him in for a chat and have a conversation about how you saw him fitting into the team and how much he might earn. Conversation over, the player would sign a contract and start training with you a few days later. But it was a cut and thrust world. And in a world like that, you get sharp or die.

I left school without a single qualification to my name, but you have to be streetwise to get on in the East End. And in the days before agents and directors of football held sway, a manager required a lot of street smarts and very refined people skills, otherwise they’d never have signed anyone. But I didn’t always get my man, because sometimes there were managers wilier than me. Many years ago, I was supposed to sign a lad called Ian Woan, who was playing for non-league Runcorn. Me and my chief scout drove all the way from Bournemouth to watch him play on a freezing cold Tuesday night and we absolutely loved him. The plan was for Ian to come down and sign for Bournemouth the following day. Instead, I got a phone call from his dad, who said he wouldn’t be able to make it and could they come down the following day instead. I really wanted to get the deal done, because it had been in the papers that he was set to sign, but his dad wouldn’t have it.

Meanwhile, in Nottingham, Brian Clough was in his office looking at Teletext on his telly. He saw this story about Ian Woan signing for Bournemouth and said to his staff, ‘Bournemouth seem to do well with non-league players, who’s this Woan from Runcorn? Anybody know him?’ One of his scouts said, ‘I know the manager at Runcorn, I’ll give him a ring and see if the deal’s been done.’ So the Runcorn manager told the Notts Forest scout that Ian wasn’t due to sign until tomorrow. Not only that, he said he was miles too good for Bournemouth. When the scout reported this conversation back to Cloughie, Cloughie said, ‘How much have Bournemouth offered him?’ The scout said, ‘£40,000.’ And Cloughie said, ‘Offer him £60,000.’

Later that same night, I got a phone call from Ian’s dad: ‘Sorry, Harry, we’ve had Notts Forest on the phone, Ian’s going there instead …’

Then there was the Amdy Faye transfer saga. Amdy was technically an Auxerre player when I included him in my Portsmouth side to play a pre-season friendly against Kilmarnock. He was suspended at the time, and he’d told Auxerre he had the flu so he didn’t have to go in for training.

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