As curtain falls on Levy's Spurs reign, the good should outweigh the bad

SO what did Daniel Levy ever do for Tottenham Hotspur?

Apart from giving them the world’s greatest football stadium, a world-class training ground, regular Champions League football, a first ever European Cup Final appearance and this year’s Europa League triumph ?

3 Daniel levy has left Tottenham as chairman Credit: ADRIAN DENNIS/AFP via Getty Images

3 Levy has received a lot of criticism from Tottenham fans throughout his reign Credit: Marc Atkins/Getty Images

3 But as the curtain falls on Levy's reign, the good should outweigh the bad Credit: Mike Egerton/PA Wire

For a quarter of a century - the longest reign of any Premier League chairman - Levy has sat, largely silently, in the Spurs directors box with an air of the Austin Powers villain Dr Evil about him.

For much of that time, Levy has been lambasted, vilified, bombarded with abuse and targeted by protests - although a salary which ended up at £3.7million per year would have helped to ease any hurt.

Finally, it’s time for the anti-Levy mob to put away their placards, because the biggest pantomime villain in the world’s greatest league has finally left the building .

There ought to have been a lot to like about Levy as a football club chairman.

A local man and a genuine Spurs fan, in an era of remote foreign ownership, a ball-busting negotiator who refused to bow to bigger clubs, and a visionary who planned and built a sustainable long-term future.

Yet while a quiet, but sizeable, minority of Spurs fans were sympathetic towards Levy, there is no getting away from the fact that the vocal majority loathed him.

Spurs went through 14 permanent managers, as well as several Ryan Mason interludes, under Levy’s watch.

And they suffered 17 years without silverware between the only two trophies of his reign.

Those were the 2008 League Cup under Juande Ramos, who was sacked seven months later, and this year’s Europa League under Ange Postecoglou who was sacked a fortnight later .

That Postecoglou decision showcased perfectly how Levy never shied away from making unpopular calls.

And attempting to balance the achievement of winning a European trophy with a worst-ever Premier League finish of 17th place was a hellish one - and the last major call of his lengthy reign.

That historic victory in Bilbao was Tottenham ’s fourth of last season against Manchester United.

Before the previous one - a 1-0 home success in the Premier League - Levy faced one of the largest mass demonstrations from supporters, urging him to go.

His decision to sign up for the breakaway European Super League scheme in 2021 had sparked similarly vociferous opposition from fans.

There were plenty of low points spanning more than 24 years as the face of owners ENIC - from Sol Campbell’s defection to Arsenal way back in 2001 right through to the Gunners’ hijacking of Eberechi Eze this summer.

Yet Levy undoubtedly improved Spurs, despite the arrival of so many big-spending rivals in English football.

Before he arrived as a fresh-faced 39-year-old former suit salesman, Spurs had finished outside of the top ten on seven occasions in the previous decade.

Now, Spurs have qualified for Europe in 18 out of the last 20 seasons - reaching the 2019 Champions League Final under Mauricio Pochettino, having also impressed on Europe’s grandest stage under Harry Redknapp.

It was Redknapp’s Spurs who broke up a sustained period of dominance by a "big four" of Man Utd, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea - despite a budget significantly smaller than any of those rivals.

By Tom Barclay

THE timing was curious but it was the right call.

He may have seen it differently, but Daniel Levy’s fractious relationship with many Tottenham fans had broken down to the point of no return.

No matter what he did - and he did do a considerable amount for the North Londoners - their view of him had become entrenched and unchangeable.

It meant that every time Spurs had a bad result, or a transfer go awry, as seen by the Eberechi Eze hijack earlier this summer, the finger was instantly pointed to Levy.

The noise would grow to toxic levels - and not just on social media - and risk enveloping the club completely.

Levy’s stewardship, along with that of majority owners ENIC, had thousands of supporters taking to the streets in protest ahead of February’s 1-0 win over Manchester United.

Even when he finally oversaw a second trophy of his 25-year tenure in May with the clinching of the Europa League - 17 years after the first piece of silverware - it was not enough to change hearts and minds.

Levy turned Spurs into genuine powerhouses of English football in his quarter of a century and built one of the greatest football stadiums on the planet.

But his lack of trophies, approach to transfers, poor communication, ticket-pricing stance and flirtation with the failed Super League, meant the alleged negatives outweighed the positives in the minds of many fans.

His trigger-happy nature of hiring and firing 15 permanent bosses irked supporters, too.

Jose Mourinho was axed just days before the 2021 Carabao Cup final, while Ange Postecoglou was dismissed two weeks on from his Europa League triumph.

Neither are expected to rush to wish their condolences to Levy now he too has departed.

My only meeting with Levy came in 2022 during the club’s Far-Eastern tour to Seoul in South Korea, where he joined a group of journalists for a cup of tea for 15 minutes at the club’s plush hotel.

He was perfectly pleasant, if cagey, and you left being none the wiser on his views.

But the view from a vast swathe of supporters on him has been clear for some time.

Levy, the highest-paid director in the Premier League on £3.7million a year, became the lightning rod for all their frustrations, rightly or wrongly.

They had called for his exit long ago and were only going to do it again and again in the coming years.

If the new generation of the Lewis family who are in control of Spurs now are genuine about their vision of the future, it is understandable why they wanted to put that toxicity in the past.

He told Gary Neville just last month that when he’s no longer at Tottenham, “I’m sure I’ll get the credit” for all he has done for the club.

Now that theory will be put to the test after his shock exit three games into the new season.

Yet Levy’s refusal to communicate allowed him to be caricatured as ruthless, greedy and unfeeling.

Sir Alex Ferguson once famously described negotiating with Levy as "more painful than a trip to the dentist" - although, during these root-canal sessions, the United boss did manage to prise away Dimitar Berbatov and Michael Carrick at their peaks.

Levy was hands-on in his transfer dealings. For many years, he was infamous for his eleventh-hour signings and, before his abrupt departure, there would be one final piece of deadline-day business - a loan move for Paris Saint-Germain’s Randal Kolo Muani .

Along the way, Levy did spend a lot of money on a fair amount of dross - including £55m on Tanguy Ndombele and the vast majority of the cash spent on a trolley dash in the wake of Gareth Bale’s world-record sale to Real Madrid in 2013.

But Tottenham’s ambition, and investment levels, were often far greater than Levy was ever credited for.

Levy will effectively hand over the reins to chief executive officer Vinai Venkatesham, the former Arsenal suit who arrived in April.

The departure of Levy’s long-term right-hand woman Donna Cullen in June was perhaps an indication that his days at the helm were numbered.

Whether his exit will smooth the way for a takeover - American and Qatari investors have long been circling - remains to be seen.

But as the curtain falls on his reign, the good should outweigh the bad.

As Levy said, in a summer interview with Gary Neville, “When I’m not here, I’m sure I’ll get the credit.”