• Harry Redknapp trial

Redknapp jury sent home for the night

Harry Redknapp will return to Southwark Crown Court on Wednesday © PA Photos

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Harry Redknapp will have to wait until Wednesday to learn his fate after the jury in his tax evasion trial was sent home for the night.

Jurors at the trial retired to consider their verdicts at lunchtime on Tuesday, but after nearly four hours of deliberation, Judge Anthony Leonard told the eight men and four women to return to Southwark Crown Court at 10am on Wednesday morning.

The jury were told to "keep their eyes on the ball'' when they consider their verdicts and to ignore footballing matters during their deliberations. The judge told jurors he will only take a unanimous verdict.

"Football is an emotive subject, stirring in an individual anything from deep passion to resentment," the judge said. "It has become so commercial that it may be thought by some to have lost its way.''

But the judge added in his summing-up: "This case is not about football but about allegations of tax fraud.''

But Redknapp's barrister, John Kelsey-Fry QC, said on Monday that some of the Crown's evidence is "repugnant to all our basic instincts of fairness''.

Mandaric's QC, Lord Macdonald, said the prosecution was "really flailing'' with "paper-thin'' explanations for the Monaco payments. "We say the evidence against him is hopelessly weak."

Both Redknapp, 64, of Poole, Dorset, and Mandaric, 73, from Oadby, Leicestershire, deny two counts of cheating the public revenue when Redknapp was manager of Portsmouth Football Club.

The first charge of cheating the public revenue alleges that between April 1 2002 and November 28 2007 Mandaric paid 145,000 US dollars (£93,100) into the account.

The second charge for the same offence relates to a sum of 150,000 US dollars (£96,300) allegedly paid between May 1 2004 and November 28 2007.

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