Darren Anderton hopes today to start 2000 as he means to go on, playing regularly in the Premiership. But whether he will be appearing in a Tottenham shirt for most of the year is in grave doubt.
The England player is back in the Tottenham squad to face Liverpool today after an absence of more than four months and yesterday toned down a fierce attack made 24 hours earlier in which he flatly rejected Tottenham's contract offer of around Stg £24,0000 a week and accused Alan Sugar and his board of penny-pinching.
Anderton's current deal expires this summer and his outburst, in which the midfielder claimed Tottenham lacked ambition and were not prepared to pay "real money for top stars", came on the day he became free to talk to foreign clubs under the Bosman ruling.
The new contract, Anderton said, "gives me only a tiny rise and I won't sign it. If they don't want me to stay, then I will go". The 27-year-old has been at loggerheads with the club for months over a new deal but his new-year message seemed only to isolate him further from Sugar - and from Tottenham fans who have not seen him perform since August 21st, since when he has had an Achilles tendon operation.
But yesterday Anderton, after coming through a practice match arranged to test his fitness, insisted he has not given up hope of signing a new contract and is due to have further talks in the next fortnight.
"I don't want to leave the club," he said, "but the deal must be right for me in all aspects, and it is not just all about money. There has been speculation that I have already made up my mind to leave but that is not true."
Meanwhile, Rangers captain Lorenzo Amoruso is hoping to secure a new long-term deal with the club. Reports have linked him to Juventus, but he said: "I'm really interested in signing a new contract with Rangers. I love Rangers and love being captain of this great club."
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