Former Tottenham star Jermain Defoe enjoyed an incredible club career, which included a lot of transfers. He even signed for Spurs twice, and the iconic striker has now explained why he left in the first place.
Defoe signed for Spurs in 2004 from West Ham and spent four years at White Hart Lane before leaving for Portsmouth to be reunited with Harry Redknapp.
Explaining his exit from North London in an interview with Gambling.com, Defoe revealed Redknapp was a driving force behind his decision, and he saw a way to escape a frustrating situation at Tottenham.
He said: “Harry [Redknapp] was the reason I moved to Portsmouth. I remember being with Harry when I was 16-years-old at West Ham. Then when I was at Tottenham under Juande Ramos, it was a frustrating time for me, as I’d scored a lot of goals up to that point and he came in and kept rotating the team.
“It got to a point where I was behind Berbatov and Keane and I found myself out of the team for long periods. It was really difficult for me to deal with that, because I was so used to playing. And even when I was coming off the bench I was scoring goals, and all my numbers were good.
“I just thought to myself I’m going to have to go somewhere and play football, because I need to be in and around the England squad. And if I’m not playing that won’t happen.”
Defoe had a highly successful spell at Portsmouth, but he only stayed there for one year before heading back to Spurs. The former England striker has no regrets about his move to the South Coast, though.
He added: “I looked at the Portsmouth squad and it was such a strong team. It was an easy decision, because Harry said: ‘Listen, just come here, play football, score goals and get yourself back in the England squad.’ The team I played in had some unbelievable players.
“We had David James in goal, Sylvain Distin, Sol Campbell – a Premier League winner, Hermann Hreiðarsson, Glen Johnson, Lassana Diarra – who signed for Real Madrid, Sulley Muntari – who signed for Inter Milan and Milan Baroš, who got the Golden Boot at Euro 2004.
“We also had me up front, and after that we bought Peter Crouch and Niko Kranjčar. The team had lots of international players that ended up winning the FA Cup.
“It was the right decision because I went there, got confidence and scored a lot of goals. And then Harry went back to Tottenham, and I ended up going back. So It was a good year, I enjoyed it at Fratton Park. The stadium was always rocking and we had a good team there.”
It is a shame Defoe had to move on for that year, because he was always so reliable for Spurs. Imagine how many goals he would have got for the club if he had stuck around and been given more game time. Still, he will definitely go down as a Spurs legend for his contributions to the club.
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