SOCCER:DAMIEN COMOLLI faces a frosty reception on his return to Tottenham tomorrow, after manager Harry Redknapp joined his Arsenal counterpart Arsene Wenger in questioning the director's worth.
Comolli, who was appointed as Liverpool’s director of football strategy earlier this month, held the position of sporting director at Tottenham from 2005 to 2008 and, before that, he had worked as a European scout at Arsenal for seven years.
The Frenchman has angered prominent figures at both north London clubs by talking up the role that he played in the recruitment of certain players. His claim, for example, that it was he who conceived the signing of Dimitar Berbatov at Tottenham in 2006 has numbered among the many to go down badly at the club. His predecessor in the role, Frank Arnesen, had done the legwork on the Berbatov deal.
Sources at Tottenham say that the only discovery Comolli made was that of the left-back Benoit Assou-Ekotto, while they also mock him for electing to pursue the signing of the striker Darren Bent from Charlton Athletic in 2007 rather than follow up the club’s initial interest in Fernando Torres, who would join Liverpool from Atletico Madrid that same summer.
Comolli has been happy to accept the credit for some of Wenger’s signings – in particular, Kolo Toure, Emmanuel Eboue and Gael Clichy – but, again, this has not been well received at Arsenal. Wenger’s relationship with Comolli is strained.
“I let you write what you want (about Comolli),” Wenger said. “He was a scout here and not a director of football. He worked under Steve Rowley (the chief scout). That is it. Only one person decides who comes in here and that is me. Nobody else.”
Comolli was sacked by Tottenham in October 2008, together with the coach Juande Ramos, to pave the way for Redknapp’s arrival. At the time of his departure, Tottenham were bottom of the Premier League.
Comolli was criticised by the Spurs chairman Daniel Levy for overseeing the sales of Berbatov and another striker, Republic of Ireland international Robbie Keane, in the summer of that year, and failing to replace them adequately, leaving the squad unbalanced. Comolli points out that on his watch, Tottenham signed success stories such as Berbatov, Gareth Bale, Luka Modric, Heurelho Gomes and Assou-Ekotto.
“I am happy when people around Europe come to me and say they’re my players and that they’re doing well,” Comolli said, in a recent interview. “I’ve had so much positive feedback since I’ve left Tottenham and I hope people now understand what the job was about. I give Harry full credit for adding a resilience which wasn’t there before, but he had very good players to work with.”
Redknapp told Levy that he would not come to Tottenham if he had to work under a sporting director and he made it clear yesterday what he thought of Comolli.
“Yeah, I think he should take all the credit, for sure,” Redknapp said, sarcastically. “They were all doing well when I arrived, you know. They were all good; they were all great.”
