The Crown V H J Redknapp – day 2

 

Day 2 saw a full day of evidence from the prosecution over primarily the first lodgement into the Monaco Bank Account named “Rosie47”. It also brought the first disparity between the two defendants over the reasons for the transaction.

To recap, The Crown’s case against the Tottenham Hotspur manager is as follows:

During his time as Manager of Portsmouth Football Club between 2002 and 2007 he received two payments from the Chairman of the Club Milan Mandaric totalling $295,000 (approximately £189,000) which was paid into an account in Monaco and upon which he should have paid tax. These were as follows:                                                                                                                            $                         £   

          First payment (Crouch)             145,000                 93,100

          Second Payment                       150,000                 96,300

The first of these payments, $145,000 related to transfer of Peter Crouch to Aston Villa. Portsmouth made a profit on this transfer and as director of football Harry was entitled to 10% of the transfer profit. When he replaced Graham Rix and became manager of the club this entitlement dropped to 5%.

Previously Harry had revealed this in the press and that he had asked for the balance of funds. The BBC have reported that Harry’s share was £115,473 but based upon what Harry suggested that this would have been £150,000. 

My thoughts on this are two fold. Firstly, why are we talking in dollars? The transaction was an English one and therefore would be by reference to a contract of employment with Portsmouth Football Club. Dollars only become relevant because Mr Mandaric had the money he used to make these payments offshore. 

If one were to reduce a sum of £150,000 for tax and National Insurance you would end up with a minimum net sum of approximately £88,500. Could this mean that Harry felt tax had been paid on the money as he got £93,100? Certainly if he is the tough businessman that the prosecution are portraying him to be he would be expected to know if he had been robbed; after all he had pointed this out to Mr Mandaric in the first place.

Secondly, if the money was the subject of a payment relating to a contract of employment then the sum should have been taxed under PAYE by Portsmouth Football Club. It would not matter how the payment was made, either within or outside of the company, PAYE would still be due. 

What would be needed, if the payment was outside of the business, would be for the Company’s accounts department to be advised so that entries could be made in the records to show an increase in Mr Mandaric’s loan account so that the profit and loss be charged with the bonus payment securing tax relief for Portsmouth.

Between the defendants Harry says it is a contractual payment, describing it as a bonus. Mr Mandaric appears to be suggesting that it was an interest free loan or an investment to help a friend out and therefore outside of the tax regime. It would also appear that the prosecution are relying upon transcriptions from the former newspaper The News of the World. 

When it comes to the defence of the case it will be interesting to see how both men defend this point as it will be critical for Mr Mandaric’s defence. In this area he, as Chairman and owner of Portsmouth, would appear to have more responsibilities towards the Crown to make sure that things have been done correctly.

We also learned that Harry had suffered a civil investigation from HM Revenue & Customs over a two year period relating to an amount he received over the transfer of Rio Ferdinand. This was described as a “gift” by Harry when completing his forms but appears to have suffered tax after the enquiry.

Gifts are a difficult area and of one receives it by reference to your employment then HM Revenue & Customs would press for tax and National Insurance. It appear that is what happened in this case.

Part of this procedure might have included completing a statement of assets which would include disclosing all of the bank and deposit accounts held at two particular dates. A failure to disclose an account or completing it inappropriately at a later date is looked upon unfavourably by the Crown and will no doubt be referred to often during the trial. 

This looks bad on Harry’s record and he will have to give some very strong reasons for the omission when the time comes. This failure to disclose, even if the Rio investigation period was much different, came at a time when an opportunity came to make a clean breast of things. If he thought the funds had been taxed that might be one thing but the interest received? 

It seems that Harry had forgotten of the accounts existence. What might Mandy Rice-Davies have to say about that? He should have been prepared by his legal team to have the book thrown at him over this failure. It could prove to be close to a red card issue. 

So the day concludes with the prosecution continuing to give evidence. 

Elsewhere it has been a disappointing day with a winding up order being made against Portsmouth for failing to pay £1.6m of tax. Clearly this demonstrates that whilst Portsmouth might be underfunded for its current operations by its owners that having football creditors paid in full does and will not work in the future and therefore must be changed. 

I cannot say whether any of these football creditors have been paid but from memory one name that was on the list was, yes you’ve guessed it, Peter Crouch. The same man who was let off for an eye gouging offence last weekend. The poor man can’t keep out of the news.      

Mine Eyes have seen the Glory: AC Milan 0 Tottenham Hotspur 1

I was astonished this morning and bursting with pride. God it’s good to be a Spurs fan for moments like these. In comments received on this site and seen on Twitter, Harry Redknapp and Peter Crouch take a fair amount of criticism, yet last night both provided evidence of their unquestioned ability.

Harry was brave. Very brave. In his team selection he went for Pienaar over Kranjcar and continued with Sandro in midfield. Having scored two goals in his last two appearances dropping Niko was a big decision but not as big as continuing with the Brazilian protégé.

But they both came off. In the same way that Crouchy benefits from the space and pace of the Champions League games so it was for Sandro and he put in a very good performance in the centre of the midfield. I did think that Pienaar was our most disappointing player on the night but enough of negatives when there was so much worthy of superlative on show.

In all honesty this was one of the best Spurs performances I have ever seen. Our control of the game from the off and professionalism throughout the 96 minutes played made this a thoroughly deserved victory. Yes I’ve seen periods when we’ve overrun a side and scored more goals but to play with such maturity and patience throughout is hard to recollect.

At half time all it needed was a goal to round off an excellent start to the match and there was the worry that AC Milan had to be better in the second period. They did step up their game after the break but it also looked like they had been shown a DVD of late sixties/early seventies Italian football at half time for there were a number of disgraceful moments in the second half none more so than Flamini’s appalling challenge on Corluka which would have warranted an immediate red card at home.

Quite how 5 officials could not decide that defies logic. The way he launched himself through the challenge made it close to assault. Charlie has played well since his return to the side and apart from one slip in the first half had been doing extremely well linking up with Lennon down the right.

For me Wilson Palacios was outstanding. As a regular at White Hart Lane I’ve seen the best and worst of the man. Great in the challenge but a worry with the ball. His confidence has been growing and last night he stamped his authority upon the game, won everything and made legends like Seidorf know he was playing. Best of all he was comfortable in possession; he never dived in or took people out with late challenges. It was great to watch.

What really sealed it for me was the way in which the central midfield players assisted the defence. All too often we’ve got turned over because we don’t defend properly all over the field but last night was a lesson for future matches. And even when Milan upped the tempo we had men in position to get the ball away.

Behind them no injury or slip ups from Gomes, on his birthday, and a couple of great saves to boot with Gallas adding a spectacular overhead kick following one in getting the ball clear. Dawson was strong exacting a variety of different headers, Gallas calm and assured and Woodgate, a massively brave substitution from Harry, collected whilst at left back Ekotto played well at times running the whole line by himself.

Rafa had a lively 60 minutes dropping deep to pick up the ball and working to keep the ball in our possession and was unlucky on two occasions, firstly forcing a decent save from the reserve keeper and then narrowly wide with a sublime chip. He was replaced by Modric who was lively and played the killer ball to Lennon that led to the goal.

Lennon had a good night. Lively in the first half you could say his final ball lacked but for me he comes into his own in the second half when the game offers space on the break. At half time I fancied this might be so as in the Liverpool game and so it proved. Thankfully he got past the last man – who tried to take him out by the waist – before squaring for Crouch to slot home. He has played well recently but still sits in Bale’s shadow!

Finally, Peter Crouch. The much maligned Peter Crouch. The man who performs well in the Champions League and international level and scored our winner in our last big 0-1 win at Manchester City to get us into the Champions League in the first place. Frankly, they could not handle him and he provided us with an outlet to aim at all night. He took the goal well for it was missable to send the gathered Spurs fans into raptures.

And so at half time in the tie we are ahead with a valuable away goal. If we take the game to them at White Hart Lane we can go through but make no mistake this tie is not yet over. But that’s not for today for this was an astounding victory and fully deserved.

I watched it in a pub in Exeter on my own but in touch by text and twitter. I telephoned the boy on the way back to the hotel and heard Harry in the box with the Sky team with Spurs fans singing in the background. I’ll remember that for a long time. When he first started supporting Spurs we were to be fair bordering on rubbish and he’s seen all the improvement and a fair bit of adversity along the way. Wins like last night don’t come along every day and you have to savour them when they do.

Who are we: Tottenham

Who? Super Tottenham

Where from : The Lane.

Maybe all of Europe has got this message after last night’s victory. Harry, thanks for that.

I don’t believe it – red rose points! Blackburn Rovers 0 Tottenham Hotspur 1

A tenth anniversary party – not mine I might add – prevented me from watching a feed of the Blackburn Rovers game but I did manage to pick up the Sky Football First highlights. On route to said event I had picked up the news about Luka Modric’s appendix operation and after feeling more concerned then ever about our chances wondered whether Rafa would drop back and we’d play two strikers up front or put in Kranjcar or Pienaar. 

In the end Pienaar was also injured and so Lennon again played on the left and Rafa went out right allowing the fit again Palacios to come into the centre with Jenas. Not the midfield we would have predicted but maybe one that was suited to the occasion. Crouch came in up front to partner Defoe and on three minutes rose ahead of Samba and headed Rafa’s perfectly hit cross from deep beyond Robinson to put us ahead.

After that our chances were few and far between but we were able to stem the tide for most of the game and when we didn’t Gomes was playing well and making a string of brilliant second half saves. We had two decent chances in the second half both created by Lennon. The first involved a tremendous break which saw him sprint from box to box before laying the ball to Defoe who finding the ball on his left foot allowed Robinson to make a save. 

The second involved a tremendous shot from Lennon after cutting inside and forcing Robinson into an excellent save following a deflection from a Blackburn player.

In defence Charlie returned and received a yellow card after he got caught out and tugged his man to the floor. He was also unlucky when he was adjudged to have brought his man down on the edge of the box when it was clearly not a foul. After the pounding at Fulham his more defensive outlook maybe benefitted the side and at left back Benny appeared to holding himself back.

However, from what I saw Billy Gallas looked outstanding. Having taken back the armband he threw himself into the game and one brilliant sliding tackle in the second half epitomised his performance. He picked up a knock in that challenge but with us being down to bare bones on the bench he continued and along with Bassong helped keep a clean sheet despite a few dodgy moments near the end. 

How this might have been the result of JJ’s knee is open to debate but a clean sheet is a clean sheet and once again Crouchy is on the score sheet but JD is not. He gave way to Sandro who saw the end of the game. Wanting to impress the young man crossed the ball late in the game conceding possession and allowing Blackburn to attack us once again – or so the boy told me who watched the latter stages on a feed.

So Gomes played well, we kept a clean sheet, the makeshift midfield worked on the night, a striker scored and Woody made the bench. And the biggest thing for me is points in Lancashire! I’ve moaned about our performances in the North West for most of the season and to prove my point I’ve included a map of the UK showing our points tallies so far (click link to load). It is unfortunate that some of the best sides are from the North West but so too are some of the middle and lower tier sides and all too often we let ourselves down on our travels to their stadiums.     

As a consequence last night was a bit of a triumph. It wasn’t a great performance but does it always need to be when we get three points and Manchester City does not!