“WORST DECISION”: An England striker once claimed, “I was warned not to join Spurs,” and he was horrified to learn how terrible his choice had been.

A former England international has now been explaining how joining Tottenham Hotspur in the past was the worst mistake of his career.

That may be a surprise to some, there haven’t been any too obvious horror stories at Hotspur Way over the years.

Of course, this is unlikely to ever be the case in the modern era either – Ange Postecoglou’s Spurs have really turned a corner.

However, when speaking on ‘Up Front with Simon Jordan’, Les Ferdinand had his own story of regret.

Former England striker Ferdinand joined Tottenham in 1997 from Newcastle United, amassing 145 appearances for the club and scoring 38 goals.

But it doesn’t necessarily seem as if things got off to a good start, as he explained on the podcast.

Former England striker Les Ferdinand says joining Tottenham was a huge mistake

Ferdinand explained that he had been warned about joining Spurs in the first place, and then wasn’t happy with how comfortable things were.

He said: “When I say it was the worst decision, I said it was the worst decision for our footballing career.

“One of the things I say to people is that when I got there we were sponsored by Pony and that was quite apt.

“I went to Tottenham who I would have thought were on par with Newcastle in terms of the way they did things. It wasn’t, it was so, so different.

“They built their own training ground, a new training ground, and the changing ground were like going into Hackney Marshes. I remember saying to Alan [Sugar] you have just built your own training ground and have changing rooms like this.

“I walked into the medical room and that was the room that was the most comfortable room, they had six beds and had TV’s on and I thought no wonder everyone is injured at this football club.

“They had TV’s in the medical room. It was too comfortable.

“Everything about it, Gerry was the manager then, and I always remember my first day of pre season I walked out and there was a group of players doing keepy uppies in one corner and a group in another corner, and another one in another corner.

“There used to be like a slope and a couple of boys were lying on it waiting for the manager to come out and I thought what the hell have I come to.

“I had been warned, a couple of players had said, Les, Tottenham isn’t what you think it is. And to be fair when I spoke to Alan he knew it wasn’t what he wanted it to be.”

Times have changed

Of course, there must have been merit to those words from a former England international at the time, even if such facilities are welcomed nowadays at Tottenham.

But it does now seem as if Ange Postecoglou has the right balance between comfort and competitiveness, at least from the outside.

In fact, it now seems as if Spurs’ project is among the best in the country, demonstrated by their approach to new contracts at the club.

So whilst Ferdinand say his move to Tottenham as a mistake, that’s unlikely to be the case for a striker arriving in North London today – or possibly this summer.