Daniel Levy once blocked Danish coach Morten Olsen from becoming Tottenham Hotspur manager, as he didn’t want a Dane or Dutch coach at the time.
Ekstra Bladet report comments from Frank Arnesen today regarding the sliding doors moment back in 2004.
Tottenham interest
The newspaper explains that Morten Olsen was a hot name back in European football at the time, having guided Denmark to the World Cup in 2002 and then the European Championship in 2004.
Both teams earned admirers for their performances at those tournaments and, Frank Arnesen, Tottenham’s sporting director, was keen on Olsen as a result.
But, as he’s now revealed him his book ‘Total football’, he found Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy in opposition to the idea.
“Tottenham needed a new head coach the summer I joined the club. I wanted Morten Olsen, but I was not allowed to take a coach from Denmark or the Netherlands,” he said.
“It was a requirement. If things didn’t go well in the first three or four months, I would come under extra pressure because I had chosen a coach from a country I was attached to, Daniel Levy thought. There was no reason to take any risks.”
Olsen confirms Tottenham interest
Morten Olsen is happy to corroborate that story too. He admits that Tottenham were in contact on several occasions, during his playing career and as a manager. Although, he can’t remember the when and how of their approaches.
“They wanted to take me at some point while I was still playing. I ended up going to Cologne instead,” he said.
He is also insistent that, had a firm approach arrived, he would have turned it down anywat. He was too focused on his work with Denmark at the time.
“The job is now such that you get noticed if your team does well, if your performance is good,” he added.
“So of course it is nice to hear when others show interest. But I would not have accepted the offer if the offer had come. The offer would have came in the middle of a contract. And I did not want to leave in the middle of a contract period.”