Stephen Carr: ‘I felt I was being taken advantage of at Spurs, but I didn’t leave for more money’

“I thought the 12 years I’d been there was a long time. I’d seen players come and go, the club having to pay them off — they didn’t give a shit, basically, and I did. And I went through all that with all the players and different managers. It was like I was being taken advantage of because I’d been there that long and didn’t cost a lot.”

When Tottenham fan favourite Stephen Carr left the club to join Newcastle in 2004, it was widely felt that he did so partly to try to earn more money.

Generally one to avoid interviews, Carr has not previously set the record straight. But speaking to The Athletic from his home in Marbella via Zoom, he explains why his time at White Hart Lane ended, and why it pains him he didn’t get the chance to say a proper goodbye.

His departure centred on a meeting with Frank Arnesen, who joined Tottenham in May 2004 as sporting director. Carr was the club captain and felt a new contract offer that was partly incentivised by loyalty bonuses at the end of each season was a “big insult”. The fact it wasn’t a big wage increase would have been acceptable, but Carr felt as though his loyalty should not have been in question, given his years of service and obvious dedication.

It was partly his unstinting commitment that so endeared him to supporters. He even played on the night his partner went into labour with the couple’s first child. It was the infamous game in February 2004 when Spurs threw away a 3-0 half-time lead against 10-man Manchester City to lose 4-3 at White Hart Lane. Carr was made aware at half-time that the birth wasn’t far away and considered leaving for the hospital. “I wish I had fucking gone!” he says now, laughing.

As for his exit a few months later, he says: “I haven’t spoken about it before but I had a meeting with Frank Arnesen and after it I thought, ‘Nah, I don’t think I’m valued, having been here that long’. People said I left for more money but I actually left for the same money.

“It’s not right because the fans were amazing with me and it was just like I was out and didn’t give a shit. It wasn’t like that, I was angry and when I look back now I should’ve said something but I didn’t because I’m not like that. It’s gone on long enough though and people need to know the truth.”

Carr always preferred to avoid speaking publicly when playing, and in retirement he is similarly private. But he makes for extremely engaging company, reflecting on his time at Newcastle, Birmingham and Spurs, for whom he racked up more than 250 appearances, helping win the 1999 League Cup and twice being named in the Professional Footballers’ Association’s Premier League team of the year. He also won 44 caps for the Republic of Ireland in a career that was interrupted by serious injuries, including the knee issues that kept him out for the whole of the 2001-02 season.

He quit football for good in 2013 and moved to Spain, where he is enjoying his retirement with his family. His teenage son and daughter, alongside business interests including a bit of work as a football agent, keep him busy. And after we establish a temperature difference of about 20 degrees between our respective ends of the line, he reflects on his playing career and explains why despite his experiences coaching doesn’t appeal.

Now 44, regular gym work and cycling keep Carr looking trim – even if those knee injuries mean he barely kicks a ball nowadays. The last time he did so in any sort of semi-serious capacity was the Spurs legends game against Inter in March 2019 to mark the opening of the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. That Carr was selected alongside the likes of David Ginola, Paul Gascoigne and Dimitar Berbatov gives an indication of his standing at the club.

Having arrived from Dublin as a 15-year-old trainee in 1992, he made his debut under Ossie Ardiles a couple of years later. A tough, athletic right-back who was solid defensively and a threat going forward, Carr became a first-team regular under Ardiles’ successor Gerry Francis. He quickly won the fans over with his class and commitment. “With any club, they like the homegrown players coming through,” he says. “If you lack quality at times, but are seen to still work hard, it helps. You’re going to have your bad days but once you don’t throw the towel in and you keep working, they respect that. So I had a great rapport with the fans. I really enjoyed it.”

It was a turbulent time for Tottenham under the ownership of Alan Sugar, with managers and players frequently coming and going. Carr though was a constant, and his quality stood out in a team that were mostly mired in mid-table, or worse. His most famous goal came in October 1999 against Sir Alex Ferguson’s all-conquering Manchester United side, who had clinched the treble five months earlier.

Having fallen behind, Spurs led 2-1 midway through the second half when Carr collected the ball inside his own half. He drove forward and arrowed a shot from about 25 yards screeching into the top corner to send the White Hart Lane crowd into delirium.

It was a spectacular goal that helped cement his hero status with the fans, but Carr actually thinks one he scored against Sunderland at the end of that season — a delicate chip after a similar run — was better. “The Man United one is my most famous one because it’s against United and in the rain so it looks better, but the Sunderland one’s a harder one to come off. It’s more delicate and technical.”

No stopping this Carr… #GoalOfTheDay pic.twitter.com/iIJwUlv0vO

— Premier League (@premierleague) January 8, 2017

Spurs ended up beating United 3-1 in that game and having lifted the League Cup under George Graham the previous season looked to be building something. Unfortunately, it was one of many false dawns. That League Cup was the only trophy Carr won at Spurs, amid a maelstrom of disappointing league finishes that from his first season as a regular in 1996-97 to his departure only went as high as ninth but as low as 14th (twice).

As Carr reels off the names of some of his team-mates — David Ginola, Teddy Sheringham, Darren Anderton — he admits Tottenham’s lack of success at the time remains a mystery. The 2002 League Cup final defeat by Blackburn that he missed through injury is one of the most agonising memories.

The turbulence of frequently changing manager contributed to Spurs’ lack of consistency, but Carr looks back very fondly on his three main managers at White Hart Lane: Gross, Graham and Glenn Hoddle.

Starting with Gross, who lasted less than a year from November 1997, Carr can’t help but smile and break into laughter.

“I loved him,” Carr says. “He was a bit loopy, a strange character but he’s another one, like Ardiles, who just gave me freedom to go forward. It was brilliant. And his training was good: physical, quick, quite technical.”

Arriving from Grasshopper Zurich, where he had won two Swiss titles as a manager and twice competed in the Champions League, there was an instant clash between Gross’s demands and what the Spurs players were used to.

“The way he reacted even on the training pitch when people make mistakes… he’d be screaming. He came from the Champions League and he was basically saying to some of the younger players, ‘You’re not showing me the hunger that I’m used to. You aren’t even near that’. He had his fallouts with some of the players.”

One of the issues the players had were with some of Gross’s less orthodox methods, like asking them to get up at 7am on the day of a match to train in the hotel car park.

“We had to do runs in circles in the car park,” Carr says, breaking into a laugh. “And then have our breakfast. I didn’t mind it, I found it funny but I was younger I suppose. If I was around 30, I’d probably be thinking, ‘Is this a wind-up?’ With more senior players who are more set in their ways, it’s very difficult to get that sort of thing across to them, to change their mentality. So without realising it you’re losing them pretty quick by getting them up that early.

“He was just a bit eccentric and strange. A bit different but different doesn’t mean bad. He taught me a lot and trusted me to do what I wanted on the pitch.”

Ultimately, Gross was judged by his poor results rather than his unusual methods and was replaced with Graham early in the 1998-99 season. Despite winning the League Cup after six months, fans never took to Graham because of his history as a legendary former Arsenal player and manager. For Carr though, it was an education, which paired with working with Graham’s successor Hoddle laid the foundations for the Irishman to become a complete full-back and twice be named by his peers in the Premier League team of the year (in 2000-01 and 2002-03).

“George taught me a lot about defending,” Carr says. “He wants you going forward but your number one job is being a defender. Then Glenn Hoddle came in, who was very technical, and his training was phenomenal so I was very lucky. I had a balance of polar opposites. Glenn was the flair and George was the structure but as a defender when you want to go forward, you’ve got both angles there. George’s training was fierce — it was tough, it was physical. You’d dread seeing him come out, you knew what you were going to get and the lads would turn around in their seats to see him and go, ‘Oh no, here he comes’. But it was respected.”

When Carr's cracker stunned Man Utd 😲#GoalOfTheDay pic.twitter.com/06b8mOplWx

— Premier League (@premierleague) February 22, 2018

Graham’s philosophy was based on building a strong defence, but Carr says he also worked hard on developing the side’s attacking play. Hoddle then cranked things up a few notches on the training pitch. “Glenn’s training was very technical but still very fitness-based, it wasn’t as if it was easy. But it was absolutely phenomenal — with everything done really quickly. Things like working on finishing, crossing and entire situations from matches. It was a different type of training and very, very enjoyable.”

On the pitch though, Hoddle couldn’t help Spurs escape their cycle of mediocrity, and after replacing Graham in March 2001 was sacked in September 2003. David Pleat stepped in as caretaker for a dismal season that proved to be Carr’s last. It was encapsulated by that infamous FA Cup defeat by Kevin Keegan’s Manchester City.

“It summed Tottenham up at the time,” Carr says. “It shouldn’t have happened like that, no way.”

Carr, by now club captain, had been through a huge amount at Tottenham. He had seen managers come and go, as well as key players such as Sol Campbell, who a few years earlier had done the unthinkable and moved to arch-rivals Arsenal as a free agent. Carr said before Campbell’s departure that he respected his fellow defender’s wish to leave, but admits now that his destination was a big shock: “It really surprised me he went there, especially as he was always into moving abroad.”

At around the same time Carr was linked with clubs such as Manchester United and Barcelona but says he was always committed to Tottenham and never came close to leaving. He then suffered the agony of a serious knee injury that kept him out of the entire 2001-02 season and meant he missed playing in the 2002 World Cup finals. He regrets the way the injury was handled, saying “there were mistakes made at the club”.

The recovery was excruciating, requiring two operations in the end, and kept Carr out for 14 months. He often played through pain during the rest of his career, reflecting the expectations on players at the time — especially ones from Britain and Ireland.

Despite the difficulties, Carr wanted to stay at Spurs when he met with Arnesen that summer of 2004. About to turn 28, he felt taken for granted and unwanted.

The wages on offer were nowhere near the club’s highest earners in spite of Carr being the captain, but it was incentivising him with a loyalty bonus particularly rankled. “If you move to a club you might agree a loyalty bonus, but I had been there since I was 15, I didn’t believe I needed to show my loyalty,” he says. “Loyalty had been given. So I found that a big insult.

“I thought, ‘Hold on. I’ve not shown any interest in leaving, that’s not right’. It’s how I felt so I packed my bags.”

Newcastle, managed by Sir Bobby Robson, was an appealing destination — even if it was a big culture change for Carr and his family. From a footballing perspective though, Newcastle were a far better side than Spurs at the time. They had just missed out on qualifying for the Champions League by finishing fifth but in the couple of campaigns prior had finished third and fourth. Alan Shearer and Craig Bellamy were two of the stars, while fellow striker Patrick Kluivert joined that summer.

In the end it proved to be a disappointing move for Carr, and he regrets the way things ended at Spurs. Missing out on a testimonial does not particularly matter to the spotlight-shunning Carr, but he wishes he could have said a proper goodbye to the supporters. “I probably made a mistake with the fans, they deserve a better explanation,” he says. “Because with me staying silent it’s as if you’re guilty, but keeping quiet is how I’ve always been.

“They might have thought, ‘That greedy fuck. He’s gone to Newcastle for more money. We thought he loved the club’. But it was nothing to do with that, and that’s the reality. I still meet loads of Tottenham fans and it’s always good, but it probably left a sour taste for them.”

Carr believes his reluctance to do interviews didn’t help him, and overall contributed to a misconception that he was arrogant and unapproachable. “It wasn’t arrogance,” he counters. “I’m not good enough to be arrogant about football. It just didn’t interest me. I didn’t need the limelight.

“It probably works against you because people think, ‘He’s an arrogant prat, he didn’t even give us the time of day’, but it was just the way I was.”

Some of his team-mates, he felt, played the media game to earn more favourable write-ups and were too preoccupied by the match ratings they were given in the newspapers.

But however things ended there and whichever way he was portrayed, Carr retains a huge amount of affection for Spurs.

He and his son still keep a close eye on their results, and they were back in north London for a Champions League game last season. Carr remains in touch with the likes of Robbie Keane and Stephen Clemence, a close friend since they became room-mates at Spurs. Others, like Anderton and Sheringham, holiday in Marbella fairly regularly during normal times and have visited the La Sala bar and restaurant where Carr is a shareholder alongside a number of other former footballers.

Having established himself at Tottenham, Carr did the same for the Irish national team, testing himself against the likes of France’s Zinedine Zidane. Carr considers Zidane the best he ever faced, above players such as Luis Figo and Cristiano Ronaldo. who he also had to try to mark. “Zidane’s like a ballet dancer on the ball, he just glides,” Carr says.

Carr played an important part in Ireland qualifying for the 2002 World Cup, helping them to impressive draws away to Holland and Portugal. That knee injury though meant he missed the tournament itself in Japan and South Korea, where Ireland were a penalty shootout defeat to Spain away from making the quarter-finals. For many though, it’s a tournament best remembered for Roy Keane’s walk-out before a ball had been kicked in anger.

Keane famously erupted at manager Mick McCarthy for the perceived amateurishness of the Irish set-up — a flash of anger that remains familiar to Sky Sports viewers since he transitioned from player to manager to pundit.

For Carr, playing with Keane and seeing him up close made a profound impression. The mood noticeably changes when Keane’s name is raised, clearly conjuring up a range of emotions.

“As a character, you’d have winners but him, he’s… different. He’s… like you can see him on TV, he’s just different.

“He wasn’t terrifying. I just think he’s… I’ve played with a lot of players but none had the stature of him in a room. He can put fear into you. I remember at White Hart Lane I went into a tackle with him on the sideline and the two of us went in full. I got up and he was just laughing, sniggering at me. And it was a proper tackle.

“I know he had his battles with (Patrick) Vieira and (Emmanuel) Petit, but they didn’t have the same presence. They didn’t have that ruthlessness. Roy just had that raw ruthlessness, he could be horrible. He was a top, top player and nobody’s even come very close to him (as a character).”

Carr adds that he never played with someone as demanding as Keane. “I remember being a young player with Ireland and would I dread being in his team at training? Yeah. You’d dread making a mistake, because he’d be on you. Young or not, he didn’t care. But then, when I played with him, does he have your back? Yeah. He’s with you all the way. So that’s his way of getting things out of you, and it keeps you on your toes, it makes you concentrate better.

“Sometimes he’d kick off but with Roy, he didn’t need to say things. He’d just look and it was enough. Once I was in the team, did I worry about getting the ball? No I didn’t, but I liked him. And as I got older I could be more like, ‘Fuck off, Roy’.

“But he’s a warrior, he’ll go all the way with you. I enjoyed playing with him. I enjoyed being around him, he’s an interesting person to speak to. I got on very well with Roy, he was always good with me.”

Reflecting on Keane’s influence, Carr thinks some of the Birmingham City youngsters might have viewed him as similarly demanding. Nathan Redmond, now at Southampton, was one player he made sure didn’t get an easy ride.

“When I trained, some young players probably thought the same about me,” Carr says. “I wouldn’t make them feel uncomfortable, but I’d be on them to take care of the ball. Don’t be flashy. I’d be marking Nathan Redmond at Birmingham and I’d be pulling him, nipping out, blocking him. He’d be like, ‘You can’t do that’, but I was teaching him that’s exactly what’s going to happen in the first team. You’re going to come up against men. They’re not going to let you do what you want, they’re going to be on you and what I’m doing is nothing.

“They’ll be smashing you, so I said, ‘You need to get your head right that you’re going to have to move quickly. It’s not the under-18s where you can flick it and do what you want and you’re better than everyone’.”

On the frequently-asked question of whether Keane is exaggerating his rage on television for effect, Carr is unequivocal: “That’s Roy. He can be very harsh but he’ll never change. He’s a dream for Sky, bloody hell. You might not always agree with him but do you like listening to him on TV? Absolutely.”

Carr celebrates beating old enemies Arsenal with Birmingham in the 2011 League Cup final (Photo: Getty)

After leaving Tottenham, Carr soon found himself face to face with another demanding taskmaster who is now a Sky Sports pundit.

Graeme Souness did not bring Carr to Newcastle, but he replaced Robson only a few months after the defender had been signed.

It was a tough readjustment for Carr, who had signed partly because of his admiration for Sir Bobby, a man he got on very well with. Carr respected Souness but was then left frustrated when he felt he tried to make him play through injury. “He was good, but I had a little bit of an issue with him because I got injured and he wanted me to play,” Carr says.

Injuries were a major issue for Carr while at Newcastle — he pulled his hamstring four times in his final season — and restricted him to 107 appearances in his four years. It was also a period of turmoil and decline for the club, who fell from fifth to 14th in Carr’s first season and finished below Spurs in every one of his campaigns. There was a run to the UEFA Cup (now Europa League) quarter-finals in 2005, but it’s a period best remembered for episodes including Lee Bowyer and Kieron Dyer’s on-field scrap, and the start of the tumultuous Mike Ashley era.

“It’s so intense up at Newcastle. The fans are passionate, they live for it. If Newcastle don’t win… the town isn’t the same. If Newcastle win, it’s a party for the weekend. When you’re winning it’s the best place in the world but if you’re not, it’s the worst.”

For too much of Carr’s time at St James’ Park it was the latter, and because of injuries he feels that he “never got going”.

By the summer of 2008, the latest episode of the Newcastle soap opera had seen the heroic former manager Keegan reinstated (he would leave again soon after because of a conflict with the club’s hierarchy over transfers). Carr was told he wouldn’t be getting a new deal, and so set about finding a new club. He had a trial at Alan Curbishley’s West Ham but the move fell through when Carr was asked to go on their pre-season tour but with no guarantee of a contract. He felt the risk of injury with no safety net was too great.

Carr went back to Ireland to keep fit but was unable to find a new team and announced his retirement in December 2008, aged 32. He had already booked a holiday to Tenerife over Christmas when he was contacted by Ian McGuinness, a doctor he had worked with at Newcastle. McGuinness was very close with Birmingham manager Alex McLeish, who invited Carr over for a trial.

He was soon signed up and made captain as Birmingham won promotion to the Premier League that season, and consolidated the following year, finishing ninth and enjoying a club-record 12-match unbeaten run in the top flight.

An excellent team spirit underpinned the side’s success, but it fell apart in 2010-11 when, after winning the League Cup with a 2-1 win over Carr’s old enemy Arsenal, the team were relegated three months later following a final-game defeat at his former club Tottenham. Carr describes that afternoon suffering relegation as “the worst day of my career”.

“Unfortunately the club was mismanaged, bloody hell — an absolute mess in the end which is sad.”

The “absolute mess” saw owner Carson Yeung convicted for money laundering in 2014 and, under new owners, Birmingham being docked nine points two years ago due to breaches of EFL profitability and sustainability regulations.

Carr was long gone by the time all this happened, retiring for good in 2013 after three knee operations in 18 months. He was about to turn 37, and the time was right.

Given he wore the captain’s armband at least once at all three of the clubs he played for, coaching might have seemed like the obvious next step for Carr. But he says doing so doesn’t appeal, with its relentlessness requiring anyone to feel extremely passionate about the job.

“You need to really love it with the hours you have to put in,” he says. “As a footballer, I’d be in for 8.45am and leave at 1.30pm. The coaches are in at 7am and leaving at 7pm and then they might have to go to a game, so you really have to really want to do it. I didn’t want that. So no, it didn’t enter my mind at all, ever.”

Carr’s other business interests keep him busy enough. And even from abroad, he keeps a close eye on how Spurs are doing.

“I love going back, it’s brilliant,” he says. “I remember being out on the pitch with Keano (Robbie Keane) at the (legends) game at the new stadium and it felt like White Hart Lane. It looks immaculate and beautiful but you can still feel the atmosphere of White Hart Lane.

“I never thought I’d see the day that Tottenham would have a set-up like that. It’s now time to win a trophy.”

Perhaps the Carabao Cup final against Manchester City later this month will see Spurs’ finally end their 13-year drought.

(Top photo: Tottenham Hotspur FC via Getty Images)