Santini admits cover up over Spurs exit

[Jager]

Former Tottenham boss Jacques Santini has admitted there were no family problems involved in his decision to quit the north London club.

Jacques Santini: Opposed Carrick deal (ShaunBotterill/GettyImages)

Santini yesterday revealed the main reason for his departure was his tense relationship with the club's sporting director Frank Arnesen.


In today's edition of L'Equipe he went even further when he confirmed the story about family problems was a cover.

He refused to comment on reports that he could soon be working with Marseille and whether that might have been a factor in his decision.

Santini told L'Equipe: 'I would like to say that I have no problems with my family even though we gave this as the reason because we thought it was a good reason for the press release.'

He then turned his sights on Arnesen and said: 'The most important thing is that I made a mistake about where responsibility lay because I thought Frank Arnesen was here to support my ideas about the job, about the team.

'Several times, I asked for explanations from the staff but with no results until the decision last week.

'I am frustrated because I still think the three-year plan was good for Tottenham.'

Santini played speculation about the Marseille post with a straight bat.

Current Marseille boss Jose Anigo is under pressure but the Mediterranean club beat Strasbourg 2-0 on Saturday evening to give him some respite.

'I do not want to comment on Daniel Levy's quotes and will not say anything about Marseille,' said Santini.

[Clotty]

I wish Spurs would just let the Director of Football thing go. Frank Arnesen is qualified but, he'll just get in a managers way and theres no point in signing someone (like Carrick) if the manager isn't interested.

I'm adament we should have just fired all the behind-the scene-staff and just hired Harry Redknapp or Bobby Robson.

[The Rule]

neither Harry or Sir Bob would have you doing as well as the Arneson/Jol combination.