{"id":50360,"date":"2025-04-25T21:08:11","date_gmt":"2025-04-25T21:08:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/50360\/"},"modified":"2025-04-25T21:08:11","modified_gmt":"2025-04-25T21:08:11","slug":"former-striker-with-62-england-caps-admits-he-could-have-joined-tottenham","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/50360\/","title":{"rendered":"Former striker with 62 England caps admits he could have joined Tottenham"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>A striker who finished his career with over 500 Premier League appearances and 62 caps for England, has admitted that he could have joined Tottenham at a very young age.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>There are a number of top players who have gotten away from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.spurs-web.com\/club-info\/tottenham-hotspur-club-history\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Spurs<\/a> during the Premier League era, with Tottenham supporters looking back and wondering \u2018what if\u2019.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.spurs-web.com\/spurs-news\/report-reveals-30-nearly-transfers-spurs-missed-out-on-mbappe-rivaldo-ronaldo-and-etoo\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Tottenham missed out on the likes of Luiz Suarez, Eden Hazard and Joao Moutinho<\/a>, who ended up thriving in the Premier League at other clubs.<\/p>\n<p>More recently, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.spurs-web.com\/spurs-news\/what-jack-grealish-previously-said-about-spurs-transfer-amid-new-rumours\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Tottenham also came close to signing Jack Grealish in 2018<\/a> before he exploded onto the Premier League stage with Aston Villa and eventually completed a \u00a3100m move to Man City.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"688\"  src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/GettyImages-1521899-1024x688.jpg\" alt=\"Emile Heskey with Liverpool manager Gerard Houllier as he signs for Liverpool.  Mandatory Credit: AllsportUK  \/Allsport\" \/>10 Mar 2000:  Emile Heskey with Liverpool manager Gerard Houllier as he signs for Liverpool.  Mandatory Credit: AllsportUK  \/AllsportFormer England striker admits he had a chance to join Tottenham<\/p>\n<p>Emile Heskey might not make anyone\u2019s list of the top 10 or 15 strikers in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.spurs-web.com\/tag\/premier-league\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Premier League<\/a> history, but the centre-forward is undoubtedly an iconic name, forming some formidable strike partnerships with the likes of Michael Owen and Wayne Rooney for club and country.<\/p>\n<p>The 47-year-old has now admitted that when he decided to leave Leicester in 2000, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.spurs-web.com\/tag\/tottenham\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Tottenham Hotspur<\/a> were one of the clubs who wanted him.<\/p>\n<p>When asked about his big move to Liverpool from the Midlands, the former England striker said on the Football\u2019s Greatest Podcast: \u201cIt\u2019s a really successful time. You had there and then the move to Liverpool, \u00a311m at a time. Well, that must have been mind-blowing for him. Was it 20, 21 years of age?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYeah. To be honest, from 16, I\u2019d had, because you all know, because you play with the national team from a young age, you kind of get attached to someone. And I\u2019d been looked at from the age of 16, but I wanted to play for Leicester. I wanted to establish myself. And I was on a bit of a roll there as well.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut then you get to a point where you\u2019ve, I\u2019ve been in the four years, five years we\u2019ve been to the playoff final and three League Cup finals. And you\u2019re like, \u2018what\u2019s next?\u2019 I was an international player by then as well.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSo you\u2019re like, \u2018okay, well, let\u2019s have a look at where we can go next\u2019. And that\u2019s trying to win titles. Liverpool was my club and I could have gone to Villa, Tottenham, could have gone to Dortmund.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Why Spurs fans may not regret failed Emile Heskey transfer<\/p>\n<p>It is impossible to predict how different Heskey\u2019s career and Tottenham\u2019s trajectory would have been different had they been successful in signing the striker.<\/p>\n<p>However, it is worth considering the fact that Tottenham boasted some outstanding strikers in the first decade of this millennium.<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps some of those players, such as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.spurs-web.com\/tag\/robbie-keane\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Robbie Keane<\/a> and Teddy Sheringham (in his second spell), may not have been signed if Spurs had secured Heskey.<\/p>\n<p>Related Posts<\/p>\n<p>      Have something to tell us about this article? Let us know   <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A striker who finished his career with over 500 Premier League appearances and 62 caps for England, has&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":50361,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5008],"tags":[748,27091,393,4884,1368,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-50360","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-england","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-emile-heskey","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-tottenham","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114400651720408435","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50360","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50360"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50360\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50361"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}