Four days after a febrile night in Bilbao, Tottenham[1]‘s players were parading the Europa League[2] trophy on the pitch when the cameras panned towards Daniel Levy and his face flashed up on the big screens.
Euphoria poisoned in an instant. Cheers replaced by jeers. Levy’s smile dropped slightly, the cameras chose not to linger, they moved away, and the strange celebrations resumed.
Some things were so badly damaged in N17 that not even the magical qualities of silver could repair them.
Levy’s relationship with a hardcore of supporters was among them so news of him stepping down as executive chairman after nearly a quarter of a century would have had some sections of the fanbase reaching for champagne.
Ultimately, the legacy he leaves is mixed. On the positive side, the spectacular edifice that will dominate the Tottenham High Road for decades to come is his creation.
It is the epitome of a modern sporting venue, a corporate paradise. It makes millions every time it throws open its doors whether it be for football, boxing, NFL or rock concerts.
Daniel Levy was jeered by Spurs fans when his face flashed up on the big screen after the Europa League final
Sections of the Tottenham fanbase will be raising a glass of champagne at his departure
Levy is rightly proud of it, just as he is of the wonderful training centre where Spurs are based near Enfield.
These are his undoubted successes. On the field, his team finished as runners up in the Champions League and the Premier League, nurtured England captain Harry Kane through its academy, signed world stars such as Gareth Bale and Luka Modric and yet he has failed to escape the image of a chairman who could have delivered more for the price of the most expensive tickets in English football.
Even on the day he opened his billion-pound stadium, Mauricio Pochettino was stealing the show by declaring it was finally time for Tottenham to start acting like a ‘big club’.
That has clung to Levy. At a time when others cut loose and spent big, his Spurs were sensible and sustainable.
It haunted him through an era when Roman Abramovich arrived and changed the landscape, because the Russian oligarch looked very closely at Tottenham too, but the ENIC Group had only just bought it from Lord Sugar.
There was no interest in selling to Abramovich, who bought Chelsea instead and they embarked upon the greatest era in their history.
As part of the Spurs statement released last night, was a line to make clear there were no changes to the ownership or shareholder structure. The ENIC Group owns more than 85 per cent of the club and ENIC is owned by the family trust of Joe Lewis (just over 70 per cent) and the Levy family (just under 30 per cent).
So, he remains bound to Spurs while ENIC own the club but by stepping down he removes a potential barrier to new investment.
Allies of Joe Lewis (right) took control and gently pushed Levy to the Spurs exit door
Tottenham have long been searching for investment to help them compete for anything more than the very occasional knockout cup, yet who wants to invest in a club with a toxic frontman?
Where, no matter how the team perform, every game is accompanied by the protests of ‘We Want Levy Out’.
There have been vague distant rumblings about Levy’s position ever since he flew to the Bahamas to see the Lewis family after holding a board meeting in the hours after the final game of a terrible Premier League season, a thumping home defeat against Brighton to leave Spurs in 17th, just one place above the relegation zone.
The Bahamas summit on the face of it, seemed to be about the future of head coach Ange Postecoglou, who would be the biggest casualty in a summer of change despite leading the team to their first trophy for 17 years. Scott Munn, the unpopular chief football officer, was put on gardening leave.
In came a new chief executive Vinai Venkatesham, formerly in a similar role at Arsenal, and more power was bestowed upon technical director Johan Lange, who drew up a longish shortlist of candidates for Postecoglou’s successor before Levy assumed the process as they whittled it down and identified Thomas Frank.
The most significant change at boardroom level, however, was the departure of executive director Donna-Maria Cullen, Levy’s trusted sidekick for many years whose exit was announced in June.
Cullen stayed through the summer. She only recently had her leaving bash and in hindsight her exit was perhaps the biggest indicator that Levy’s position was under threat.
The chairman was absent from the Super Cup final against Paris Saint-Germain in Italy, which was unusual. His place was taken by Venkatesham in the post-match ceremonies with Levy in the United States where one of his daughters was about to start university.
Vinai Venkatesham (left) came in as chief executive in March and will be a key part of the board
The wave of euphoria winning the Europa League unleashed enabled Ange Postecoglou to leave Spurs as a hero
When he returned to his usual seat in the directors’ box for the first game of the Premier League season against Burnley, he was beside Vivienne Lewis, daughter of billionaire Joe, who placed ENIC’s Spurs shares into a family trust before he was charged with insider trading in 2023.
Peter Charrington, who stepped into the role of non-executive chairman, had been discretely added to Tottenham’s board in March.
‘I am looking forward to working closely with Daniel and the board to help the club achieve long-term success,’ said Charrington, an ENIC director, a former banker and close ally of Lewis, at the time.
Last night, upon his elevation to the chair, Charrington offered his thanks to the Levy family and heralded a bright future. ‘This is a new era of leadership for the club, on and off the pitch,’ he promised.
‘I do recognise there has been a lot of change in recent months as we put in place new foundations for the future. We are now fully focused on stability and empowering our talented people across the club, led by Vinai and his executive team.’
Levy’s exit was confirmed just before 6pm. There was no forewarning, simply a statement released on the club website containing quotes from Levy to say how ‘incredibly proud’ he was of the work he had done building the club into ‘a heavyweight competing at the highest level’.
This much is true. It is easily forgotten Spurs were not in terrific shape prior to the ENIC takeover, which thrust him from nowhere into the role of chairman. His first move was a populist one, sacking George Graham, who had never been accepted by fans because of his Arsenal past, and replacing him with Tottenham icon Glenn Hoddle, who he lured from Southampton.
Hoddle would be the first of his 13 permanent managerial appointments. There were hits and misses. Brief stays such as Jaques Santini and Nuno Espirito Santo contrasted with Harry Redknapp and Pochettino, who both led the club into the Champions League.
But only two of them ever won anything. There was Juande Ramos with the EFL Cup in 2008 and Postecoglou on that febrile night in Bilbao in May when Postecoglou’s team beat Manchester United to claim the Europa League, their first European trophy for more than 40 years.
The wave of euphoria it unleashed enabled Postecoglou to leave as a hero. It will cast Levy’s legacy in a better light and perhaps over time the public mood towards him will soften and acknowledge his achievements but not quite yet. First the corks will pop. Those who wanted Levy out, they have their wish.
References
- ^ Tottenham (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Europa League (www.dailymail.co.uk)