• Premier League

Redknapp: Sherwood not to blame

Harry Redknapp has hit out at former club Tottenham and suggested Tim Sherwood paid the price for "whoever decided to spend or recommend spending £111million on a load of bang average players".

Speaking in his Sun column, Redknapp claimed Sherwood's outspoken, honest nature - which is thought to have been pivotal in chairman Daniel Levy's decision to sack him on Tuesday lunchtime - did not sit well with some Spurs players.

Sherwood's public falling out with Sandro is one example of the friction suffered between coach and squad, but Redknapp - who was sacked as Spurs boss by Levy in June 2012 - believes the former player and head of football development is not to blame.

"The real culprits of Tottenham's failings last season are not Tim, Les Ferdinand and Chris Ramsey. It is whoever decided to spend or recommend spending £111million on a load of bang average players," Redknapp said. "Every single one of those deals should be scrutinised in great detail.

"There's probably a little clique of about four or five people there sorting out all the deals and haven't they done well?

"There should be an investigation to find out on whose say-so those deals were done, whose judgment was it to bring in a bunch of players who have not taken the team on.

"You suspect his [Sherwood] crime was telling it how it is. There's no place for people like that in football any more it seems.

"Tim doesn't do PR. He does plain talking, in-your- face and that's why he gets a lot of respect from a lot of people. It may rub a few players up the wrong way, of course.

"These days they go to their agents and whine, who in turn go to the chairman of the club. There's only one outcome - Tim gets the elbow just a few months after taking on the job after Andre Villas-Boas was, no surprise, sacked."

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