While discussing Tottenham’s tactics in their pursuit of Morgan Gibbs-White, Simon Jordan has shared a story about how Daniel Levy went behind his back to sign one of his former Crystal Palace players.
As Spurs fans are well aware by now, Nottingham Forest have officially filed a legal complaint against Tottenham after the North London club activated Gibbs-White’s £60m release clause last week.
According to reports, Forest owner, Evangelos Marinakis, is furious that Gibbs-White’s release clause was leaked, and the transfer appears to be in limbo for the time being.
It has been suggested that although the outcome is likely to be in Tottenham’s favour, Forest will not make it easy for Tottenham to get the Gibbs-White deal over the line.
Simon Jordan sheds light on Daniel Levy’s negotiating practices at Tottenham
While reacting to the Gibbs-White saga, Jordan has now revealed that Tottenham have a history of approaching players directly behind the back of their clubs.
He shared that when he was the owner of Crystal Palace, Levy once called him up to bid for Wayne Routledge on transfer deadline day, having ensured that the player was ready and waiting for a medical if a bid had been accepted.
Jordon told talkSPORT: “Tottenham have had form on this. I had Daniel [Levy] do it to me with Wayne Routledge, in terms of speaking to my player before I’d even given him permission to do so.
MORE SPURS STORIES
“Making offers to me on transfer deadline day, and then me saying: ‘Well, there’s no possible way, Daniel, that you can even get it done today because the player hasn’t even had a medical’. Levy said: ‘Oh, don’t worry about that, he’s around the corner.’
“Oh, he is, is he? Well, now he’s not going. Definitely. Forget it. Now he’s definitely not going. I didn’t have a complaint about it, but I didn’t like my player’s attitude because I’d looked after him since he was 12 years old. I thought a bit more loyalty from him and his family would be befitting.”
Morgan Gibbs-White saga is regarding a breach of confidentiality
All clubs approach their transfer targets and agents directly these days, which is why we never hear complaints of players being “tapped up” any longer.
However, the issue with the Gibbs-White to Tottenham deal specifically has to do with the confidential detail in his contract being leaked to a third party.
Forest understandably feel that they would have got a bigger fee for the attacking midfielder if his agent had not leaked the details of his release clause.