Hunched over a chicken curry, his hooded eyes not even noticing the shards of rice shooting from his mouth like white bullets as he talks and eats at a fast lick, Harry Redknapp clutches a chirruping cellphone in his spare hand.
He apologises and pats me on the arm whenever it beeps again. Although he diverts every incoming call, the idea of actually turning off the phone never enters Redknapp’s garrulous mind. His wheeler-dealer persona as busy old ‘Arry is hard to shake.
Any chance, however, of striking another deal for a new player to join troubled Southampton seems gone for the day.
”It just ain’t happening,” Redknapp concludes wearily.
The downbeat mood spreads beyond his scrabble in the transfer market. Redknapp exudes the pensive air of a man who knows this is his final job in football — and that a happy ending is far from certain.
Even Southampton’s welcome 2-0 defeat of a woeful Liverpool last Saturday, their first league win in eight matches under Redknapp, was followed quickly by resounding victories for their fellow relegation contenders Crystal Palace and West Brom, while Norwich recorded the story of the day with their last-minute draw against Middlesbrough. The struggle has merely intensified.
Redknapp concentrates on cleaning his plate. In contrast our table, splattered with curry and rice, resembles the mess he finds himself in as Southampton prepare for Saturday’s FA Cup fourth-round clash against their bitterest rivals, Portsmouth — from whom Redknapp, after much boardroom plotting, resigned as manager in late November.
With a fortune bolstered by his considerable success in property development, the 57-year-old Redknapp appeared to be heading towards a long sabbatical or even a canny retirement from football. But two weeks later, in an act that ignited Portsmouth’s fury, Redknapp became Southampton’s third manager of the season. The St Mary’s cup tie will be a particularly acrimonious reunion and yet another trial for the beleaguered Redknapp.
”When I left Portsmouth,” he says, ”I was happy. I’d had a great two years there but I wanted a break. I needed a break. Unfortunately, things happened which made me angry. I wouldn’t have come back to football otherwise. That’s a fact.”
A few days after his departure, the Daily Mail ran a story, after interviewing the Portsmouth chairperson Milan Mandaric, that accused Redknapp of being involved in a series of excessive payments to players’ agents. The headline screamed: ”£3m — That’s what Harry’s special agents have cost me over two years, says Mandaric.”
Redknapp shakes his head.
”That was my worst moment in football. My wife and I went out to Spain on the Friday and the story broke by the time we woke up in Marbella. I’m getting out of bed and Sandra shouts, ‘Harry, you better come see this.’ It’s quarter past seven on Saturday morning and it’s all over the TV. I rang Peter Storrie [Portsmouth’s chief executive] who was with the team in Bolton. He said it was disgraceful and, at 8am, Mandaric calls from Dubai and tells me, ‘Harry, I never said any of this.’ He denied it all.”
Redknapp shrugs when asked if he believed Mandaric.
”I don’t know, really. Maybe the way he said it was not the way he meant it. The headline gave it an awful twist. I came back and we held that press conference where Milan confirmed I had nothing to do with any transfer. All the deals were done by Storrie.”
Redknapp usually explains his rapid re-emergence at Southampton with an old cliché — ”I was getting under the wife’s feet.” He talks more honestly now. ”I thought, ‘I can’t finish this way.’ If that hadn’t happened I would’ve been content doing some building and developing in Poole. And we’ve just bought this little place in Spain, Sandra and me, and we enjoy our two bulldogs. Having time to walk them there would’ve been great. I would’ve been out of football for good.”
It may also be true that, like most of his battered breed, Redknapp is addicted to the trauma of management. Yet, in the Premiership basement, the pressure is telling. ”I joke about being brought home in a box because it’s so stressful. These past six weeks have been really difficult — more than I ever expected. I’d be lying if I said I’ve had any moments of enjoyment.”
Victory over Liverpool might have changed that, but he paused when asked if he might have made a mistake in taking the job.
”I’d be a liar if I said I never thought that. I’ve thought it a few times. Football wears you out and, when things are not going well, it’s not enjoyable. When you win you look forward to that bottle of wine with your dinner — but if you lose the feeling is indescribable. You feel responsible for everyone who supports that team. It’s crazy. There’s no way out. I’ve got to do whatever it takes to keep this club in the Premiership. I can’t worry about what it is doing to my health — but you feel it lying there at 3am, fretting about the job.”
Redknapp then searches for the perennial optimism that defines the great managerial survivors.
”This is a good club with fantastic facilities — it’s a terrific club. It’s just that we’ve got a battle to stay up. It’s do-able but it’s going to be hard.
”But I’ve always gone to clubs on their knees. Bournemouth were in the fourth division and I took them into the second for the first time in their history. West Ham were in that division when I joined and Portsmouth was even tougher. They were languishing at the bottom of the first division and people said I’d never turn them around. The following season they were champions and we had a great time in the Premiership. Southampton were in the bottom three when I took over — so it’s familiar.”
He is candid enough to admit that he is unsure if he is a better manager now than he was at West Ham, and his memories of Upton Park ring with an exuberance his south coast travails have rubbed away. They also underline the fact that his managerial pedigree has not been earned just by signing countless players on loan and cut-price deals.
At West Ham, Redknapp points out, ”we never got relegated in my eight years and ended up fifth in the Premiership”. More strikingly, the club unearthed a rich crop of talent — which Redknapp says was a direct consequence of the youth policy he introduced with Jimmy Hampson, ”a development officer I nicked from Charlton. Jimmy was a West Ham fan and we produced incredible kids like Frank Lampard, Rio Ferdinand, Joe Cole, Jermain Defoe, Michael Carrick and Glen Johnson.”
That list provides Redknapp with an opportunity to celebrate his nephew. ”The others have a long way to get to Lampard’s level. I’ve never seen a kid work so hard. He’s the same now — a lovely boy too, well brought up [and] unfazed by the money and fame. He’s proper.
”Rio’s different — but what talent. I loaned Rio to Bournemouth and [Manchester United’s then chairperson] Martin Edwards asked how much we wanted. I said, ‘He ain’t got a price; that boy will be the best defender in Europe.’ United paid £30-million for him a few years later.”
Redknapp crafted a different triumph at Portsmouth. Yet that achievement has been besmirched by belligerent supporters and sniping directors.
He is visibly upset when I mention that earlier this month Storrie, who also worked with him at West Ham, was reported to have said: ”I’m fed up with comments that the success [at Portsmouth] over the past three years is all down to him.”
”Why would he say that?” Redknapp asks in genuine bewilderment. ”I shouldn’t give a monkey’s because it’s a team effort and I got on really well with Milan 90% of the time. He had problems with other people than me.
”There’re plenty of good people in football — mostly players and managers. So I’ll look forward to seeing the Portsmouth boys because I signed every one of them. And on the coaching staff I gave Joe Jordan, who’d been out of work a long time, a job. I’ll even look out for the new manager [Velimir Zajec]. He’s a decent man. And if I see Milan I’ll shake hands. There won’t be any feeling of me trying to get one over them.”
There’s a note of regret when he says: ”Tottenham was the only big job where I got lots of mentions [to take over as manager]. I thought that was a real possibility last season. That would’ve been good for me but it’s gone now. Southampton is my last job. I might have said it before but, this time, I really mean it.”
It’s impossible to imagine Chelsea’s Jose Mourinho or even Martin Jol of Spurs talking so wistfully over a sloppy curry.
Redknapp is far smarter than the ”good old ‘Arry” caricature but, in the face of a sophisticated European invasion, he sounds like an old English football man whose time is closing in on him. And it’s a symptom of his intelligence that he can read the signs as well as anyone. Victory on Saturday against a club that hurt him, and Premiership survival for Southampton, now seems the very least he deserves. — Â