The mention of Daniel Levy's name elicits a range of reactions when you speak to those who have dealt with him over the years - a rueful grin, a grimace and exhalation of air or occasionally a nodding approval.
The 63-year-old walked out of the doors of Tottenham Hotspur this week in a move that shocked everyone beneath a certain level inside the club and certainly those outside it. The man who had instigated huge projects to modernise the Premier League club yet also micro-managed the north London outfit for 24 years to such a degree that he even chose the doorknobs and various fittings inside the new stadium was now gone.
In the end, it was about the football on the pitch rather than what the Premier League's longest serving chairman had built around it that decided his fate. His exit appeared forced by the only people more powerful than him at the club - the Lewis family. They wanted a broader, more modern structure at the club, in keeping with one of its increased size, with a CEO - Vinai Venkatesham - at the helm and felt that would bring a greater chance of sporting success.
'Levy out' was the cry from sections of the fanbase across recent seasons and now that is the reality rather than something shouted from the stands.
The image painted of Levy from the outside towards the end of his reign at Spurs became something of a caricature - an awkward man who cared more about the thrill of negotiations than what the player being signed could actually do on the pitch. Some chairman and CEOs relished the challenge of talks with him, others chose not go through it more than once.
Those who worked with him draw a more rounded picture of Levy, a chairman who tried to maintain the near impossible balance of being a family man and a businessman who worked all hours. Those who worked under him or alongside him would often wake to see messages sent at ungodly hours of the night.
Some people football.london spoke to, many of whom preferred to remain unnamed in the wake of this week's events, backed up some aspects often attributed to Levy's character that are out there in the media while others hit back on a few points.
One person who had worked with Levy over years at Tottenham said that while the former chairman was certainly awkward in group settings, he was engaging when it came to one-on-one conversations.
They admitted working for him was not simple for Levy is a highly ambitious person and a common theme from most spoken to was that even when you thought you had delivered what was needed he would always try to push for that little bit more from you. Some from other clubs suggested it was similar in negotiations over players.
Another who had worked with Levy for a spell in north London would only say: "For all his faults he’s been a great chairman. He'll be a tough act to follow."
Some involved in transfers over the years would praise Levy's part in them and his determination to get a deal done, while others would speak of the delays to negotiations regarding minutiae that could scupper them and some pointed to a belief on the chairman's part that the chance to join Tottenham should be the biggest factor when it came to talks with a player and manager's representatives.
For instance, in the Netherlands, some around Feyenoord suggested that the talks to bring Arne Slot to Tottenham in 2023 put too much belief in the Dutchman wanting to leave for the Premier League with claims that the financial package involved was not hugely different to what he was already earning at the Dutch club. Those talks never reached their conclusion and Slot would go to Liverpool the following summer and win the Premier League.
One criticism around Tottenham's negotiations has always been that they have been willing to pay the transfer fee but not the wages that have become commonplace at top clubs so their pool of targets would shrink further. Some players who have left the club to move on to other Premier League sides lower down the table over the years have earned more after the move.
That strict wage structure has helped Spurs find stability but has also held them back and it's one of the things that has become associated with Levy's tenure, particularly by the fans.
One supporter, Rachel Martin, has engaged in various meetings with Levy as a former head of the Tottenham Hotspur Supporters' Trust and now as the trust's representative on the club's Fan Advisory Board.
"Daniel Levy came over as a very astute businessman who transformed the financial stability of Spurs," she told football.london. "He’s a genuine Spurs fan and it was clear that the lack of trophies meant that for him there was “unfinished business”.
"We tried to ensure he understood the experience and perspective of Spurs fans. We needed success on the pitch, to show bravery and greater ambition, and we needed to be valued as the lifeblood of the club. I’m not sure if he really got that."
One man who would know plenty about life with Levy and what he got and didn't get is Martin Jol.
The Dutchman was brought to Spurs as Jacques Santini's assistant in 2004 only to take over from the Frenchman who quit just three months into the season. Jol would spend three years at the club, taking them back into European competition and a sickness bug away from the top four and the Champions League.
Many credit Jol with laying the foundations with his style of football and development of young players that others like Harry Redknapp and Mauricio Pochettino would eventually build upon.
Yet it all ended on the night of October 25, 2007 when whispers spread around White Hart Lane during Spurs' 2-1 defeat to Getafe that Jol was being sacked that evening, in the wake of Tottenham courting Sevilla manager Juande Ramos, who claimed the north London club had made him a "dizzying offer".
The fans sang the popular Jol's name throughout the remainder of the game but it was not enough. The end came with a conversation with Levy following the match.
Jol should be bitter and have more gripes with Levy than most, but instead the former Ajax boss, now 69, spoke with balance to football.london about his former chairman in that classic Dutch straight-talking style.
"The thing is with Daniel, maybe in general, you can go to the left, you can go to the right and the truth is in the middle, you know what I mean," he said.
"So sometimes I think, this man he can't be loved, because he distances himself. In the last 18 years or so since he never phones, even when there's a player in Holland or whatever, he never asks anything. Sometimes I feel entitled to send him a message about a player. You know 'don't do this' and the only thing he says is 'thanks', because he thinks 'I can't get too close with people' because that is not what he does. He always distances himself."
Despite the circumstances surrounding his own departure from Spurs, Jol believes that his former boss in N17 was someone he felt he could trust even if they never built that close a connection.
"Daniel is an honest guy, believe me, he's an honest guy. He's very well educated. He will never do you any harm, which is why he needed people around him. He relied on a small group of people," he said.
"He never wants to have a connection. Maybe it's me, maybe only with me, but I think that's him as a person, you know, he doesn't want you to say 'OK, I'm in touch with Daniel' or 'I spoke to Daniel'.
"He is not a communicator and he doesn't know anything about football, because Daniel has got his one thing, that is business and that's 100% the truth. So that is why he took Frank Arnesen [during my time] and Frank was a friend of mine so that was easy enough.
"Daniel commercially is a great man and I get on with him, but I was never sure if he could get on with me."
Jol is another who points to Levy's workaholic nature as being a key driver in the growth of Tottenham as a global football brand in recent decades.
"He puts an unbelievable effort in, but he got a lot out of the club. He's a very good commercial guy. He's unbelievable commercially," he said. "I mean, you could say 20 years ago Spurs was a big club, but nobody knew at that point why they are big, but now you can say Spurs is a big club because of the stadium, because of the fanbase, because of the training ground, the facilities. They are still seven or £800million in debt, as you know, but he has creativity commercially, he's amazing like that."
Jol believes that Levy's undoing in terms of sporting success has mostly come through recruitment failures, which he pins on those the then chairman appointed.
"He's commercially unbelievable, but 80% of his time, his recruitment staff were terrible. That is what I think, because people keep on criticising him about not spending money but I think they spent £700million or so over the last four or five years," he said.
"The amazing thing is, how can you spend let's say £700million, and there's not one player in this squad who can go to Man City, Arsenal, Chelsea. I mean [Mohammed] Kudus went from Ajax, not to Chelsea, not to Man City, he went to West Ham, and of course he's very talented, but he's not better than [Dejan] Kulusevski, 100% not, but I know him from Ajax very well, he's so talented.
"But I mean, he wouldn't go to Chelsea or Man City or Man United or Liverpool. You see Liverpool, they want it, they buy it. But I mean Richarlison wouldn't go to Arsenal or Chelsea or whatever, all these players. How many players are there in the Spurs team now, who would be bought by one of the big four or five?
"[Cristian] Romero could go anywhere but you feel like if he plays for a while at his top level, he will get injured. Romero is a good, decent defender, but I will tell you one thing, the guy they sent to Hamburg now - Luka Vuskovic - will be better."
The Dutchman remembered one player in particular he was managing at Ajax after he left Tottenham that he knew would be perfect for his old club.
"Daniel was unbelievable for Spurs, but not on the technical side. When you look at the players they've signed they had so many misfits. That is what I said to Daniel 'why don't you give me a phone call?'. I had Toby Alderweireld. I had [Christian] Eriksen made his debut for me," said Jol.
"And I had Luis Suarez. I said 'why didn't you buy Suarez?'. He said 'because my people said that he is almost the same type of player as Van der Vaart'. Huh? Suarez is a striker. With me, he played from the right, but I knew that Suarez was not the right winger, but I had Marko Pantelic as a number nine, so I used Suarez as a false wide player like [Mohamed] Salah. Suarez is a legend. It was £25million, but [Daniel] didn't listen."
Jol, Redknapp and Pochettino were the only ones to break the cycle of managers under Levy lasting on average 18 months to two years. The chairman appointed 13 permanent managers in his 24 years at the helm.
When asked why others did not last as long, Jol thought for a moment before saying: "Because they didn't achieve what Daniel has in mind. With me when I was fifth, and believe me, you had all these big teams, to be fifth with the money he spent then was a miracle.
"Daniel always underestimated me with players because that is the biggest quality of a coach - a judgement call. You know 'he's good', 'he will be good', 'he's young, but he will be a top player there'. That is the judgement of a coach. That is the most important thing.
"But Daniel always listened to [Damien] Comolli, because he was obsessed with his new structure with a technical director. Comolli would have told him 'With Martin, you won't win there and with Ramos you win there because he won the UEFA Cup'. I think he won it twice. Like Unai Emery, because Sevilla has won the competition I think over the past 10 years or so, five times the Europa League or UEFA Cup.
"So he listened to Comolli, but he should have looked at [Michael] Carrick or [Dimitar] Berbatov or [Aaron] Lennon or look at Reto Ziegler. Do you think Pochettino would have played with the 18-year-old Ziegler on the left and in the same game Aaron Lennon 18-years-old on the right? No, but I had to make the best out of it, and that is what I think Pochettino did, was to get the maximum out of your players.
"Of course Aaron was a big talent but you surely have to play them to develop them, despite their age. It's the same with Gareth Bale.
"With Pochettino he got close and I do think in Daniel's heart, he wants to be your friend, but he distances himself so much that he won't have friends [in football]. I wanted to be his friend. I wanted to help him because that is what I am, but he didn't want any of it. He listened to Comolli."
Jol admitted that there were clashes over his contract at Tottenham after he had been bumped up from assistant manager and over other interested clubs.
"I mean you can't say that he treated me right if you consider what I did for him. Daniel once told my agent 'Martin is not loyal' , and it's from when I had said 'OK, I go to Newcastle or I go to Ajax' because I was on a fraction of what other managers were being paid," he said.
"He said 'there's five or six other managers at the gate'. You know, is that loyal? He said to me I was not loyal, but then my agent got me what I should have been paid because at that time, [Daniel] didn't want to let me go.
"So he had to [pay] and I think that hurt him, because he's an unbelievable negotiator. But if you want something like Liverpool have done with [Alexander] Isak, you have to pay. Of course it hurts, having to pay £125million, but sometimes you have to do it, and Daniel was not doing that. He wants to have his way. They can tell him whatever they want, but if he negotiates, he will hurt you."
Levy's son Josh is the co-CEO of Tavistock Group, which owns a majority share of ENIC, the investment company that owns Spurs. Jol always felt that it would be the younger Levy who would take over from his father eventually at the helm of the north London club.
"I always thought that Josh would follow in his footsteps. Josh, his son, I think would be ideal because he's a very good boy. I liked him. He could communicate. He had what his father lacked and I mean back then I think he was 14 or 15. Now he's probably in this thirties or something. I thought, that is the ideal solution. Step back, put Josh in your situation and do things from the background," he said
"Because people can find Daniel difficult to deal with. That's the trouble. Sometimes I like him, you know, but I've got mixed feelings with him all the time because, you know, if you want to do well with him, if you want a relationship with him, it's difficult."
Levy ended his tenure with that Europa League triumph in Bilbao, the second trophy of his 24-year tenure. He sacked Ange Postecoglou soon after and stated that that trophy was not enough. He wanted Spurs to win the Premier League and the Champions League and compete across all competitions.
Just three months later and Levy will not get to see that as chairman. He leaves a legacy that many believe is to be found in bricks and mortar more so than silverware and Jol is one of those people.
"His legacy will be what he said himself, that he built an unbelievable stadium and he's got facilities that are second to none. I mean it's a big club now, not only in the big fanbase," said Jol. "I always say Spurs is the biggest club in London. People will say it's not true but I think with the stadium and the fanbase was always there. We had 25,000 season ticket holders on a waiting list. I mean, people don't realise how big Spurs are.
"Now you see it in the new stadium. Every player says it's unbelievable. Believe me, it's different with Spurs and with Chelsea when you go into the stadium.
"Now, the only thing is the technical side. That is why I say how many players from Spurs would get into the team of Chelsea because I mean all the players they sign for like 80, 90, 100million. Spurs will spend £60million on a player, so they spend money but they are not the top, top players you can get for that price.
"You can get top players for less, like Jan Vertonghen and Toby Alderweireld, but if you're spending huge money then you're buying the finished article. If you're not then it has to be top recruitment and over 20 years at Tottenham, many have not been great or good enough."
The phrase Levy used to Jol on the night he sacked him back in 2007 have always stuck with him and now those words feel fitting for both men.
"One reason Daniel was still there for the last 10 years was because he owned the club. Before there was only one guy, Joe Lewis, who could get rid of him. The rest could shout and criticise, but he would stay there because he owns the club," said the Dutchman. "He wasn't just a chairman on the payroll. He's also got the shares.
"So something happened now and somebody told him 'let's call it a day', which is what he said to me. He said 'let's call it a day'. I will never forget that. I hate this phrase. Now they probably said to him 'let's call it a day'."
The former chairman's outgoing statement did not speak of any reasons for his departure which lends itself to Jol's theory. After 24 years, 13 managers, two trophies, one state-of-the-art training complex and one incredible stadium on Tottenham High Road, Daniel Levy has indeed had to call it a day.
