Harry Redknapp - The Biography. Les Roopanarine
West Ham grew at that time. A lot of clubs back then concentrated on running. The ball was kept away from the players, with the theory being that it would make them hungry for the ball at the weekend. But Ron got us to do a lot of work with the ball, and so practices were always interesting. We did a tremendous amount of technical stuff in training, and I think that anybody who played through that era and went on to coach believed in that philosophy as well.’
Equally, Redknapp learned from Greenwood what not to do. The memory of how Moore once complained to him of Greenwood’s reluctance to offer praise or encouragement has become one of Redknapp’s most frequently-recounted vignettes. ‘The most important thing anyone ever said to me in football was what Bobby Moore said one day,’ recalls Redknapp. ‘He said he had sixteen years at West Ham under Ron Greenwood, the best coach I have seen without a doubt, but never in sixteen years did he give him a pat on the back and say well done. Mooro said to me: “Harry, we all need that.” And that is a lesson I learned.’ Small wonder, then, that an ability to lift players, to instil confidence and belief, has been so central to Redknapp’s success. Results don’t lie. Redknapp has masterminded Cup shocks against Manchester United with three different teams. He transformed Portsmouth from Championship strugglers to Premiership stayers. He wrought an instant upturn in the fortunes of a Tottenham side that had gone eight games without victory. It is a CV of genuine substance.
John Williams believes that Redknapp’s empathetic handling of players has been central to these achievements. ‘Harry was never one for the big Churchillian speech,’ says Williams. ‘He might speak collectively about how the team would play, but he was very keen after that to get stuck in to individuals. He would go round the changing room and have a quiet word with everyone individually. Once he’d spoken to you, you were concentrating and you didn’t look up. But I’d imagine that after he’d gone from myself, he was whispering words of wisdom in somebody else’s ear. So it was more a one-to-one thing than massive speeches, and I’ve heard that he still does that to this day.’
While Redknapp’s ability to inspire is an aspect of his coaching acumen that owes little to Greenwood, it would be an injustice to suggest that he learned nothing about pastoral care from his mentor. Redknapp recalls an episode early in his West Ham career when a club official, eager to lock the gates, called time on an impromptu kickaround in the club car park involving himself, Bobby Moore and Frank Lampard Snr. Greenwood was not amused when he learned that his players had been turfed out. ‘He told me that from then on, if we wanted to kick a ball around until midnight in that car park, that was fine,’ recounted Redknapp in the Mirror. ‘He said even if we finished playing in the middle of the night, he’d make sure there was someone there to lock the gates. He didn’t want to do anything to stop us playing football. He loved the game and he loved seeing people who wanted to learn.’
Greenwood was similarly keen to see that the knowledge he imparted to his protégés was passed on to the next generation. To that end, he actively encouraged his players to obtain their coaching badges and to work at local schools. ‘I went to West Ham in 1964, and in 1965 I took my preliminary badge with Bobby Howe,’ recalls Trevor Hartley, who had acquired his full badge by the age of twenty-one and later became the Football League’s youngest manager when he took over at Bournemouth. ‘Ron used to encourage Bobby and I, instead of going to play golf in the afternoons, to coach at local schools. We ended up at the Holloway School in Islington with Bob Wilson from Arsenal and Mike England from Spurs. Ron thought that Bobby and myself would be the type to become coaches, and that helped us out because we grew in confidence while teaching the kids.’ Redknapp benefited in similar fashion from the culture of learning established by Greenwood. ‘Harry was one of the players that we took on the preliminary badge when John Lyall was coaching at West Ham under the auspices of Ron,’ recounts Bobby Howe. ‘I would have to say that Harry was one of the better coaches, even then – and it was a very long time ago.’
Having taken the first step along his future career path, Redknapp wasted no time in putting his newfound skills to use. Along with Frank Lampard Snr and John Bond, his future manager at Bournemouth, he spent four afternoons a week taking coaching sessions at a nearby school. ‘When we had finished training,’ recalls Redknapp, ‘me and Frank Lampard [Snr] used to go to a place in Canning Town called Pretoria School. It was a tough place but it was Frank’s old school and they had a lovely sports master called Dave Jones. We used to teach the kids and play a game of football in the gym. We loved it and as we were only on six pounds a week, two pounds fifty for the afternoon didn’t half come in handy.’ The experience instilled in Redknapp a commitment to youth development that has never left him. The legacy bore its richest fruit at West Ham, where Joe Cole, Rio Ferdinand, Frank Lampard and Michael Carrick all reaped the benefits of Redknapp’s experience, progressing through West Ham’s youth ranks en route to achieving international recognition and league titles. Lampard describes in his autobiography, Totally Frank, how Redknapp, together with Lampard Snr, ‘nurtured young talent, encouraged it and then gave players a platform on which to develop’, in the process ensuring that ‘parents whose kids were coming through trusted the club to help their sons make the grade.’
While Greenwood no doubt applauded the efforts made by his former charge to restore West Ham’s reputation as the Academy of Football, he was rather less appreciative of Redknapp’s contribution to the cause on October 12, 1968. Half an hour into a league clash at Elland Road, Redknapp became involved in a contretemps with Billy Bremner, Leeds United’s fearsomely competitive captain. Bremner turned up the temperature on a heated exchange by skimming Redknapp’s shins with his studs, Redknapp retaliated, and Bremner went down as if shot by the proverbial sniper. ‘It was a joke,’ remembers Bonds in his autobiography. ‘H never stuck one on anyone in his life – and if he tried his hardest could not have flattened Bremner the way the Leeds star dropped.’ As the referee scribbled down his name, an incensed Redknapp could not hold his tongue. The result was a second yellow card, this time for dissent, and with it the dubious distinction of becoming only the second player dismissed during Greenwood’s tenure. ‘Obviously the club are upset about it,’ said Greenwood after a 2-0 defeat. ‘We have a proud record for behaviour on the field. You cannot go seven years without a player being sent off unless discipline is of a high standard. I am not forgiving Redknapp, but a young player does not kick out like that unless something has happened to him.’
The following week Redknapp bounced back in style, supplying the ammunition for Hurst to complete a double hat-trick as West Ham trounced Sunderland 8-0 to equal the biggest league win in their history. Hurst’s third of the afternoon came from a Redknapp cross off Billy Bonds’ short corner, while the England forward later swept home his sixth from a typically inviting Redknapp centre. A fortnight later, Redknapp completed his redemption in emphatic fashion. ‘We played against QPR at Upton Park and Harry won it for us, 4-3, with a tremendous volley,’ recalls Hartley. Redknapp reverted to his more customary role of provider either side of the New Year, winning a penalty at Southampton on Boxing Day before setting up Peters for a blistering half-volley as Newcastle were beaten 3-1 at the Boleyn Ground. By the season’s end, he had racked up thirty-six performances in a side that finished eighth in the First Division.
Nonetheless, Redknapp’s best result of the campaign – as his son, Jamie, has never been slow to remind him – came in pre-season. On June 30, 1968 Redknapp married Sandra Harris, an eighteen-year-old hairdresser from Essex, at St Margaret’s Church, Barking. A staunch ally throughout the numerous highs and lows of her husband’s career, Sandra is the unsung hero of the Harry Redknapp story. ‘I think Sandra is the fortress behind Harry, to be honest,’ says Milan Mandaric, the business tycoon whose takeover of Portsmouth would later have such significant implications for Redknapp. ‘Sandra is tremendous for him, she’s a pillar.’
Best man at the Redknapps’ wedding was Frank Lampard Snr, who presided over the occasion on crutches after breaking his right leg against Sheffield Wednesday toward the season’s end. Lampard proved an apt choice, for he later married Sandra’s sister, the late Pat Harris. The couple had met four years earlier, shortly after Harry and Sandra began dating, and their marriage completed the foundation of a distinguished football dynasty. A serious ankle injury prematurely curtailed the development of Mark, the older of the two Redknapp boys. But Jamie, a cultured midfielder who signed for Tottenham