Harry Redknapp once said he was convinced the role of England manager was for him, only to learn over the radio that the FA had ignored him in favor of Roy Hodgson. Now 78, he was widely seen as the obvious choice to replace Fabio Capello in 2012 after an underwhelming tenure with the famous Italian national team.
Redknapp ruled in north London for four years between 2008 and 2012, turning Tottenham Hotspur into Champions League contenders and building a reputation as a great manager. However, the FA opted to hand the reins to Mr Hodgson instead. Appearing on the Soccer AZ podcast in late 2024, Redknapp made the surprising admission that despite never having formally interviewed for the role, he believed he had secured the position until a bombshell revealed otherwise.
“I never actually had an interview or anything like that. I was getting messages, but I was at Tottenham at the time, saying, ‘Oh, you’ve got the job,’ or ‘You’ve definitely got the job,'” he said.
“So I was quite shocked to be honest. I was driving and I heard on the radio that it was Roy Hodgson. I wish Roy the best of luck, Roy is a great guy.”
He continued: “But I was surprised, I was 10-1 with the bookies or something ridiculous, so it looked like I was going to get it, but it didn’t happen.
“I would have loved to have tried it, but I couldn’t talk to anyone or discuss it with anyone. I think Roy said he wasn’t going to interview because he thought he was pretty much guaranteed[to get the job]anyway. But they didn’t interview anyone. They just decided that Roy was the answer.”
Despite leading England to the quarter-finals of Euro 2012, Hodgson had a very disappointing spell with his country. England were eliminated in the group stage of the 2014 World Cup in Brazil and suffered a humiliating defeat to Iceland in the last 16 of Euro 2016.
He subsequently resigned from his position. Redknapp previously claimed that a clause in his contract with Spurs would end his chances of eventually earning a place in the England squad.
In his 2022 memoir, When Harry Met Sandra, he wrote: “There was a crazy clause in my contract that said if another club, in this case the FA, came after me, I would have to pay back £5m to Portsmouth, the last club I was at before Spurs, and I would have to pay them my wages at Tottenham and whatever was left on my contract,” the now-retired manager recalls.
“It looked like a £15m buy-out clause…I didn’t look at the fine print. I didn’t have that and it was my fault and I should have done it. It was all a crazy clause in Tottenham’s favor, but what can I do? I think I would have put a very high price on the table for a free agent and I think Roy would have been the cheaper option.”
“By the way, I’m not criticizing Roy or putting him in a corner. I think he’s a decent player with great experience. I just think he was probably a little more in the free agent’s cup of tea than I was.”
Redknapp has expressed his opinion on the FA’s choice to appoint Thomas Tuchel as England manager in January this year. The German then guided England to next summer’s World Cup, but Redknapp insisted the position should have been given to an English candidate.
“It’s not like he was a huge success,” Redknapp said of Tuchel, who won the Bundesliga, won Ligue 1 twice and reached the Champions League final twice (once with Chelsea).
“He’s been around a few clubs,” he added on Sky Sports. “‘I’m very patriotic. I think we should have an English manager, but obviously the field of choice was very narrow. There aren’t many opportunities for English managers in the Premier League right now. It’s all foreign owners, so it always has to be a foreign manager.’
