Harry Redknapp has a lot of rather pointless time on his hands at the moment.
He’s in some TV jungle show which I have blanked for many years but from what I’m told that he has a chance of achieving the incredible distinction of joining such as joining such as Tony Blackburn as King of the Jungle! SIGH.
Boring doesn’t start to get close as far as I’m concerned but The Mirror has run a tale from the old geezer in which he tells of the two worst signing he ever made at the Hammers.
It doesn’t take a lot of working out who they might have been but the stories of their indiscretions whilst at the club are fun.
The first was Florin Raducioiu from Spanish side Espanyol in August 1996 who has been a star for his country in 1990 and 1994.
Redknapp said: “I worked for a couple of hours with Raducioiu on the first day in training and I must admit he impressed me. He was a quality finisher and I really thought he’d be a success.
“But the moment we got into anything physical, he didn’t want to know.
“He just couldn’t face being tackled in any shape or form. Dicksy was anxious to get stuck in to him to see what he was made of, but Raducioiu made it clear that he wouldn’t be challenging for anything.”
Redknapp added: “Don’t ask me to explain how a former world class player can suddenly become a fairy, but something had obviously happened to Raducioiu and he’d completely lost it.
“He’d been used to queuing for three hours in Bucharest for a loaf of bread and suddenly he was wearing a £28,000 watch. Perhaps the transition was too much for him.”
Other players complained about Raducioiu. Paolo Futre confronted him, calling him a “big girl”.
The end came when he did a no show for a League Cup match away at Stockport and nobody could get hold of him.
Redknapp said: “So you can imagine my mood the next day when a friend rang me and told me the previous evening he’d spotted Raducioiu out shopping with his wife in the Harvey Nichols store in London.
“I knew then I had to get rid of him but it wasn’t easy.
Eventually, he was sold back to Espanyol.
Redknapp’s remarks on Raducioiu were made in his 1998 autobiography.
There’s no prizes for guessing the second of the two shocking signings – a certain Marco Boogers who arrived from Sparta Rotterdam in 1995 after being priced out of a deal for Bristol Rovers forward Marcus Stewart.
He was reliably informed that Boogers was “different class” but right from the word go Boogers’ attitude stank. He was among the stragglers at the back whenever we went for a run, he didn’t want to work, he was lazy and the players all took an instant dislike to him.
“I suppose you could say he could play a bit, but certainly he was nowhere near as impressive as the video had made him out to be.”
I met Harry a couple of times and he was very much like the image he is portraying on I’m a celebrity, I know Bonzo doesn’t think a lot of him for understandable reasons but we all make mistakes, his wife forgave him for running her over after all 😉
Raduciou was a class forward who had played for AC Milan! In his first game back in Spain after leaving West Ham he scored both goals for Espagnol in the Barcelona derby when they beat the more famous Barcelona team! Yes, they were penalties butt he point is that he had played at a high and would play again after West Ham. Harry gave him very little time to adjust in the days when it was harder.Look at the goals he did score for us and how few we scored before Hatrson/Kitson arrived.Harry mismanaged him and the Harvey Nicks story sounds about as creditable as a creative tax return.
Forgot to add this was the time when Harry’s solution to a goals shortage by getting Mike Newell on loan!