On this day: Harry Redknapp departs Portsmouth for Spurs

The story broke in the late hours of that Saturday night.

In the aftermath exactly 10 years ago, Peter Storrie revealed how he believed he had convinced Redknapp to remain as Pompey boss.

The then chief executive was left dumbfounded having earlier been told by the 61-year-old he had opted to stay.

Storrie was the man credited with persuading Redknapp to remain at Fratton Park instead of joining Newcastle back in January 2008.

He thought he had repeated the trick following lengthy discussions between the pair on Saturday evening.

Then came the fateful Redknapp phone call saying his mind had been changed '“ again.

Speaking to The News at the time, Storrie revealed: '˜It happened a few times with Newcastle, to be honest, it was a little bit on and off the same way.

'˜Certainly, early-late Saturday evening, I thought he was staying.

'˜I was a bit shocked when he changed his mind again after that because I genuinely thought he was staying.

'˜He just said he'd decided to take it. What more can you do? We constantly spoke to him, constantly wanted him stay.

'˜Even up to a pretty reasonable late hour on Saturday, we thought Harry was staying and were pretty convinced he was staying.

'˜Then at 9.30-10pm I had to ring up Joe Jordan and Tony Adams and tell them Harry had gone.'

Meanwhile, Storrie admitted Spurs approached Harry Redknapp a day before speaking to Pompey.

He added: '˜I had a phone call from Daniel Levy on Saturday but obviously discussions had already gone on before that.

'˜Harry told me on Friday but I had no contact with Tottenham until Saturday.'