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Darren Bent is facing a £100,000 fine after apparently using Twitter to launch an astonishing attack on Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy as Sunderland boss Steve Bruce revealed a deal for the striker is only "50-50".
Bent has accused Levy of complicating his £14million move, which the 25-year-old is keen to make after Spurs manager Harry Redknapp made it clear he is surplus to requirements at White Hart Lane.
Bent was expected to join Sunderland this week but Stoke, Aston Villa and Hull then revealed their interest and Levy is believed to be holding out for a fee nearer the £16.5m Spurs paid Charlton for him two years ago.
The forward has undergone his medical in the North East but said on his Twitter page yesterday: "Seriously getting p***** off now. Why can't anything be simple. It's so frustrating hanging round. Sunderland are not the problem in the slightest. Do I wanna go HullCity? NO. Do I wanna go Stoke? NO. Do I wanna go Sunderland? YES. So stop f****** around Levy."
Sunderland boss Bruce today expressed sympathy for the player but admitted the chances of a deal had dropped.
"Someone says Darren has been Twittering," said Bruce. "I don't even know what that is. Footballers aren't just objects.
"There's a human being in this who wants his future sorted out. We will do our utmost to get the deal over the line. I would say I was really confident that would happen a couple of days ago, but now I'd say it's 50-50."
Bent's attack has stunned Spurs, who say the delay in the transfer involves the normal negotiation process, and they were today trying to contact him or his agent to establish that the comments were genuinely posted by Bent.
It appears they were his as this morning his Twitter site, db10thetruth, was initially locked to all but his friends and then later removed.
A club spokesman confirmed they will deal with it as "an internal matter" which usually means a fine of two weeks' wages, which in Bent's case would amount to around £100,000 although the club will not jeopardise the deal.
The row overshadowed Spurs' 3-0 victory over Hull in the final of the Barclays Asia Trophy in Beijing today.
Spurs deserved their victory at the Workers' Stadium and took the lead in the 17th minute when Luka Modric struck a glorious cross-field ball to Robbie Keane, who controlled it superbly before rifling his shot under goalkeeper Tony Warner.
Hull wasted chances before Spurs won a penalty when Jermain Defoe was brought down by Warner. Keane slotted home the spot-kick and Aaron Lennon scored a late third.
Reader views (28)
The sooner Levy, gets rid of Bent the better, he wants to join the Black Cats, so let him go, Sure Levy wants to get a deal worth a lot of money, in this carzy world of fees, £12 mil is quite right for him, they should not have bought him in the first place, but we need the money if we are to go after Handelaar.
- Arthur Gray, Isleworth, Middlesex
Typical of someone of Levi's ilk. They like to dish it out but they can't take it.
- Tangomike, Kensington, London
Rottenham are Skanky and deserve no respect. I hope they do a Newcastle and implode into the lower leagues. I used to be a nwutral with them but now I just do not like the way they behave at all. Crouch is a 9 mil player but, Bent has to be a 16 mil player. Crumbs - He is their reserve striker. Double attitudes stink and I can smell the stench of Rottenham Spotpoor from here!
I now like Arsenal after years of avoidance - At least they are honest!!!
- Rob, Kettering UK
Daniel Levy is once again dragging the club through the gutter with bad publicity etc.
I seem to recall Levy threatening to sue Liverpool (Keane), Man Utd (Berbatov), Arnesen (Chelsea)for tapping up those players only to keep his mouth shut for an extra few quid. Yet Levy and his entourage have a track record of doing exactly the same with the Ramos appointment.
Levy cannot even sack a manager (Jol) with dignity and even screws that up. How much longer can this fool continue to make a mockery of our great club?
- Steve, Medway,England
Well Guys it seems Darren has apologised on the club's website...
But he entitled to his opinion, come spurs, let the man go, you lot never wanted him..
- Adrian, london
Kevin - Of course Ramos failed after winning the Carling Cup, as 3 of his 4 forwards were sold by the start of the following season! Darren Bent has been treated woefully by our club, despite scoring the goals he was bought to score. As for Levy, the man been truly awful, remember it was his set up with Commoli? Remember the cost incurred in employing Ramos & dsiposing of Jol & co? Dont tell we will finish top 4, above Arsenal & Harry is the greatest manager in the universe. Signings to date this summer are 2 young players from Sheffield United (the better of the two, Walker, returned on loan to Sheffield United) & an aging Crouch from Portsmouth for £9 million, with little chance of a future sell on, as Harry mentioned as a reason not to sign him! Prediction, we wont break into the top 6, never mind the top 4, Arsenal will finish above us & Harry will make all sorts of excuses. Sorry if this upsets fellow Tottenham fans, but I will, as usual, be proved right.
- Rob Hotspurs, South London
It is all a plot about money, get back in your high chairs and go with the flow.
Only beleive 10% of what you read in the papers children.
- Colin Stevens, USA
Spurs are treating Bent with disrepect, His goals aslong with Pav, kepty SPurs, up then we but back the players we sold and who didn't want to play for us.Keane and Defoe, now we have 3 strikers,who could'nt get into their teams (maybe except defoe), im still waiting for these players to take us to the next level...
Harry, is getting all the experienced players in..
- Adrian, london
I kind of agree with Rob for once, but the problem with Bent is that he does not fit the system Spurs want to play and thats it. He never comes across as a confident player amd misses more than he scores but 17 goals speaks for itself. With Defoe and Keane infront of him he does not stand a chance and afraid Spurs are suffering the shame of having paid out £16m+ for someone vastly over rated which is not the players fault. Fair enough the club want as much money back to cover their losses so if Sunderland are happy to pay £14m I think that is great business still in this climate. Let him go and suffer the small loss and perhaps levy will learn a harsh lesson from it. The only decent thing I can say about Levy is that he has kept the club on a sound financial footing and despite last seasons farce we still are a lot better off than many clubs money wise and who better than redknapp to wheel and deal to get the squad right. Fact that we had to spend £50m in january to stay up hampers us but rather that than be in Newcastles position.
- Steve, WHITE HART LANE
Wildewood, Steve Medway, my generalisations are unfair to you two, apologies - there are always exceptions to every rule.
- Stu, Beckton
Jamie, please could you change your location to a more accurate "Cloud Cuckoo Land" as that's where the majority of Spurs fans seem to reside.
Thanks
- Joe, Romford
Yet when he won you that cup Kevin he was the best manager since sliced Jol wasn't he? And when you nabbed Bent from under our noses he was a fantastic signing who would propel you to the top four wasn't he?
"It wouldn't have happened under Harry" - you really have no idea what's coming at all, do you...?
- Stu, Beckton
Rob Hotspurs is absolutely correct to highlight the damage done by the chairman of this once great club and it's a scandal that the man is getting away with such profligacy. If he ran any other business in such a slap-dash fashion he'd soon go bust.
- Wildewood, U.K
I think Rob's comment 'Ramos with no hope of succeeding'l he needs to say about his knowledge on managers, players and teams.
Ramos didn't cut the mustard since winning the Carling Cup and should have been shown the door for that bit of management alone. No self respecting would allow the attitude the Spurs players had on the pitch after that win. They wouldn't have got away with it with Harry.
As for Bent.
His foul language and disrespect to the people who have paid him £50k a week for 2 years is typical of a yob getting too much too soon.
These are the people who continuously say 'I'm a professional. No your not Bent your just blessed with a bit of football talent. Now do the decent thing and apologise to the club and Daniel Levy for your outburst.
- Kevin, London
And with that typical and unbelievably blinkered nonsense, Phil, you sum up perfectly why West Ham cannot stand your fans one bit.
Levy sold your two best forwards last year and gave the manager no time at all to replace them. We all saw what happened, certainly in E13 we found it fantastic to watch, the perennial "Champions League this year" lot bobbling around the bottom three.
He is now messing a player about over a transfer, to try and squeeze an extra few shekels out of the deal.
Rob may comment in the negative a lot of the time it's true - but compare that to the ridiculous and continual "All we need is [insert any player far too big for Tottenham here]" spoutings of the rest of you (Captain Black excepted) and the year-upon-year "we'll finish top four this season" boastings.
You have no concept whatsoever of where you are in the food chain. Ask fans of ANY other club.
It's not "support", it's blinkered foolishness and a total lack of any sense of realism.
It's beyond a joke.
- Stu, Beckton
Levy is just utterly hopeless as i seem to recall this chairman of our dithering on Dimitar Berbatov's transfer to Man Utd last season. Levy also left this transfer to the last minute of the deadline day and as a result replaced him the the utterly useless Frasier Campbell.
Now he's stretching Darren Bent's transfer out to he last minute cos like always he wants a few more extraq quid.
Levy is just totally incompetent!!
- Steve, Medway,England
I am rather surprised that Stu finds the time to keep up his nonsense posts while his beloved westham are playing!Perhaps he is not interested in the game,Would appear he prefers posting tripe about other teams in favor of watching his own team play.
I think any true Spurs fan knows what Rob notSpurs is all about,Fake.
Can you imagine a team with a full set of supporters like the two mentioned above.
One who has no interest in his own team (Can not blame him for that)
The other who seems to support 2 bitter rivals!!
No more response from me now concerning these two.
Off to watch my team play now.
COME ON YOU SPURS.
- Jamie, essex
I've finally succumbed to having to make a remark on this site as Rob Hotspur or Gooner or whatever has got to me as well. I have never heard so much drivel from someone in all my life. Every single story he comments on negatively and has never had anything positive to say. Just boring repetive remarks about Jol and Levy.zzzzzzz
Darren Bent's not bad but does he really suit our style of play NO. At least with Crouch, Defoe and Keane will score a hatful more than Bent would of. Harry's form since taking over was just shy of getting us into that elusive Champions League spot. Give HARRY a chance next season and he may well surprise us all.
- Phil, NORTH LONDON, UK
If this is the same person who calls himself Rob 'The Gooner', 'Hotspur', 'Galaxy' etc, can you imagine what a sad person he really is, sitting in front of a computor all day thinking he is being clever trying to wind up decent football fans.
He need to get a girlfriend, some mates, basically a life!, also his team are not what it was a few years ago, with a manager as narrow minded as him.
- Terry, London
Stu - Thank you for your comments. I am castigated by fellow Tottenham fans who dont like hearing reality. I think this 'Rob Gooner' they continually harp on about, is doing the reverse of what they mistakenly think I am doing. Obviously not the brightest of individuals. They may not agree with my comments, but I think they are usually highly accurate, perhaps they should concentrate on attempting to make some constructive comments, istead of the nonsense they spout.
- Rob Hotspurs, South London
Your opening comment on the Bobby Robson thread certainly bears that out, Ted.
- Stu, Beckton
Stu, whether Rob makes a valid point or not, he's been properly "outed" as a Gooner masquerading as a Tottenham supporter, for the simple reason that he makes an error in his postings that no self-respecting Tottenham supporter would.
He is, I believe, the correspondent who also goes by the title "Rob Gooner", as a consequence, everything he writes about Spurs is biased with a malevolent intent. He never writes anything positive about Tottenham, which once in a while even the most pessimistic fan' would and when using the psuedonym "Rob Gooner" writes rave reviews that even some Arsenal supporters sometimes find embarrassing.
- Captain Black Of The Mysterons, London, England
He'll have to learn that brain must be fully engaged before operating mouth.
- Ted, London
Darren Bent is 100% right in his comment. Levy needs to stop being a complete tosser and let the lad leave. I can't beleive spurs fans are not on his back to let him go. Levy is dragging the club through the brown stuff. Whats he trying to acheive by doing this, This sort of thing only goes on at clubs like newcastle, the deal is either off or its on, Make your mind up Mr Levy
- Scott C, sunderland
Well said Rob, Levy and Harry out!
- Sean, Cork, Ireland
Those of you on here who dig Rob out (and call him a Gooner - unreal) should really take a proper good look at yourselves.
That's the most sense posted by a Tottenham fan since I've been reading this site.
- Stu, Beckton
Our treatment of Darren Bent has been appaling. He has consistently scored goals whilst with us & I believe he was our top scorer last year. We have replaced him with Crouch who scored less goals than he did last season. Harry's comment that his wife could have scored a chance that Bent missed was extremely disrespectful & hardly advisable as Bent is a player who would clearly benefit from having his confidence built up. Now Levy is up to his usual poor negotiations, which last season left us, at the start of the season, with no Defoe, Keane & Berbatov and only Pavlychenco as a last minute replacement, leaving the expensively acquired Ramos with no hope of succeeding. Indeed, we had to spend £40 million repurchasing former players & signing others, to ensure premiership safety. This has quite obviously left us at a severe disadvantage fund-wise, when trying to improve our playing squad this summer. All this could have easily been avoided & I cant understand how Levy hasnt born the brunt of criticism for his awful reign as Chairman.
- Rob Hotspurs, South London
"Do I have a medical, agree terms, shake on the deal and then decide to walk away and join another club instead because I have the integrity of John Terry? A thousand yesses more."
- Stu, Beckton
