{"id":983402,"date":"2026-05-25T07:32:17","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T07:32:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/983402\/"},"modified":"2026-05-25T07:32:17","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T07:32:17","slug":"tottenhams-record-signing-went-to-watch-arsenal-games-whilst-still-playing-for-london-club","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/983402\/","title":{"rendered":"Tottenham’s record signing went to watch Arsenal games whilst still playing for London club"},"content":{"rendered":"

Darren Bent admits he used to watch Arsenal<\/a> matches when he played for Charlton<\/a> in the Premier League<\/a>. The confessed Gunners fan joined Tottenham not long after.<\/p>\n

Bent, who began his career with Ipswich Town<\/a>, became Spurs’ club record signing when he arrived at White Hart Lane for \u00a316.5million<\/a> in 2007. This move came off the back of two solid seasons for Charlton in the first tier of English football.<\/p>\n

However, the former Sunderland and Aston Villa striker has come clean, saying that before he signed for Tottenham he would watch their bitter rivals Arsenal<\/a> when they were in midweek action. Bent did this despite still playing for fellow top-flight side Charlton.<\/p>\n

You can listen to brand new episodes of In The Mixer on Spotify<\/a> and Apple Podcasts<\/a>!<\/strong><\/p>\n

Speaking on In The Mixer<\/a>, brought to you by Sky Bet, Bent said: “Yeah [I was an Arsenal fan when I played]. What people do forget is I used to watch Arsenal in the Champions League midweek while I was at Charlton. Sitting in the crowd, obviously all wrapped up.”<\/p>\n

Bent continued, touching on how he and his Chelsea-supporting father dealt with his transfer to Tottenham. He said: “Because it’s your job, in that environment the fan gets knocked out of you.<\/p>\n

“For me I saw it as an opportunity: ‘Oh my goodness, I’m going to Tottenham.’ Which was another step up. Even my dad, Tottenham is his least favourite club, but he was like, ‘You have to go to Tottenham. You have to go. You have to.’<\/p>\n

“He would always say, if Chelsea were playing Tottenham or whoever I’m playing against, as long as Chelsea win, if I score two, he’s happy. It was a crazy one. But he was just saying, ‘You have to go, it’s a step up, look at their team. They finished fifth two years in a row.'”<\/p>\n

Bent started life as a Spurs player under Martin Jol<\/a> and Juande Ramos soon took over. During his second season at the club, Harry Redknapp arrived<\/a> and the striker says the two quickly fell out.<\/p>\n

“It weren’t great,” said Bent. “There’s no point in me trying to beat around the bush. Some managers you get along with, some you don’t. I think with Harry, when he first came in, I did really well. I think I scored five in his first five.”<\/p>\n

But in January 2009, Bent missed a gift-wrapped opportunity to score in a match against Portsmouth and Redknapp infamously commented that his wife could have converted it. This upset the striker, who said: “That comment, the ‘My wife could’ve scored that…’ It blew up. It was harsh, but that was just Harry being Harry and he thought it was quite funny.<\/p>\n

\"Jermain<\/p>\n

Redknapp preferred strikers like Defoe to Bent(Image: Getty)<\/p>\n

“After a while, there was a period where I knew he wanted to sign other strikers and that’s where the relationship started to go completely different directions. Because even though I’m scoring goals he [wants me not to score]. One hundred per cent.<\/p>\n

“You feel it. I think he bought back [Jermain] Defoe and wanted Crouchy [Peter Crouch] and I knew that he wanted Crouchy. I remember we played Fulham and I was in really good form.<\/p>\n

“I started against them and he took me off and I just knew I wasn’t starting next week. He’s waiting for me to have an off game and I’m out and I was out. From then on, I was out. That was it. I was done. From there, our relationship just went completely opposite directions. But we’re fine now, and we get on now.”<\/p>\n

DARREN BENT EPISODE ON YOUTUBE<\/a> : Subscribe now to be the first to watch the latest episodes of In The Mixer and other original shows, brought to you by Sky Bet. Watch All Out Football’s episode with Darren Bent here<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Darren Bent admits he used to watch Arsenal matches when he played for Charlton in the Premier League.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":983403,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4100],"tags":[103621,82,40162,40071,2921,94,12513,79609,52827,273473,64482,101,160035,79,201981,16,15],"class_list":["post-983402","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-arsenal-fans","tag-arsenal-transfer-news","tag-charlton-athletic","tag-darren-bent","tag-emirates-stadium","tag-football","tag-harry-redknapp","tag-highbury","tag-jermain-defoe","tag-martin-jol","tag-peter-crouch","tag-premier-league","tag-robbie-keane","tag-sports","tag-tottenham-transfer-rumours","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116634056414245014","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/983402","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=983402"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/983402\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/983403"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=983402"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=983402"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=983402"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}