Daniel Levy may not have been as powerful and as influential at Tottenham Hotspur as many people believe, according to one of the club’s former managers.
It has now been a year since Levy’s departure as Spurs chairman, a position which he held for nearly a quarter of a century.
The Lewis family have been keen to get across that they are now in a new era, where the club will operate differently, marking a clear break with the Levy era.
That has certainly been visible with the way the club have operated in the summer transfer window, breaking their previous transfer record deal of £65m (for Dominic Solanke) three times in the latest window.
Former Tottenham manager claims Joe Lewis, not Daniel Levy, was calling the shots
A new feature in i News on Levy contains interviews with various Tottenham officials and even former Spurs managers who worked with the 64-year-old.
One unnamed former manager has told the outlet that it was Joe Lewis who was calling the shots, with Levy only being the face of the club’s ownership.
The manager is quoted as saying: “Joe ran the club. Joe owned the club, and Daniel ran the club for Joe, but Joe was always on the end of the phone. Daniel didn’t get rid of me, Joe Lewis got rid of me.
“He (Levy) never interfered. Okay, once or twice, there were players I wanted to bring in, there was a transfer we didn’t agree on. But he was not at the training ground – he was there if I wanted to talk to him, but he didn’t interfere.”
Levy was quiet but very hands-on at Spurs
The report also quotes other unnamed former Tottenham officials as saying that Levy was “good company” but a man of “few words”.
It is revealed that some Spurs players were ‘amazed’ by how hands-on the former Tottenham chairman could be. He is said to have visited them at home to seal the deal on contract negotiations and even knew the club’s kit man.
One source said about the former Spurs chairman: “He’s not going to be the life and soul of the table, but I think that’s just his personality.”