Harry Redknapp Trial: Solely Responsibile for Bank Account But 'Utterly Disorganised'

Tottenham manager Harry Redknapp told City of London Police during an interview that he was too "disorganised" and barely literate enough to fiddle his taxes, a court has heard.

Jurors at Southwark Crown Court on Thursday were played a tape recording of Tottenham manager Harry Redknapp being questioned by police, during which the 64-year-old denied taking bungs.

The former Portsmouth manager told police, which is published by the BBC: "I am not going to fiddle taxes, I pay my accountant a fortune to look after me.

"I am completely and utterly disorganised. I write like a two-year-old and I can't spell."

Earlier in the week the court were informed by the prosecution that Redknapp was a "hard-headed businessman", yet on Thursday his banker told the jury, which is published in The Times, of a spate of "disastrous" business decisions which included " a very unsuccessful" £250,000 takeover bid of Oxford United.

According to an HSBC executive, Redknapp lost every penny as part of a loan to take control of the club.

The aforementioned HSBC executive, Alan Hills, who held regular meetings with the former Portsmouth boss alongside his solicitor and accountant, suggested Redknapp had in the past shown acumen in the property market, but agreed with the Tottenham manager's barrister, John Kelsey-Fry QC, that "with the benefit of hindsight, some investments were disastrous".

The court was also notified of Redknapp's initial failure to inform Hills, an associate director with HSBC in London between 2000 and 2009, of "Rosie 47" - Redknapp's Monaco bank account which was named after his pet dog and the year of his birth.

Hills told the court, which is quoted in The Times: "I would have expected to have known or be told of it (the offshore bank account)."

On Tuesday, the prosecution had alleged that Redknapp did not tell his accountant or bank about an account in the tax haven of Monaco, and John Black QC claims Redknapp "was feigning almost complete ignorance of its existence" during the Lord Stevens enquiry.

Although the court heard, via the prosecution, that Redknapp had been reluctant to reveal the existence of "Rosie 47", on Thursday the jury were told that the current Tottenham boss, and leading candidate to succeed Fabio Capello as the next manager of England, had sole responsibility for the Monaco bank account which is at the centre of the £189,000 bung allegation.

The vice-president of HSBC in Monaco between 2000 and 2005, David Cusdin, notified Southwark Crown Court via videolink, that he was aware of Redknapp's visit to the tax haven principality in order to open an account.

"I was certainly aware of his visit - it was quite possible that I didn't open the account, it was one of my team - but I was certainly aware of the visit," Mr Cusdin told the court. "I don't have a recollection - but I could well have shaken his hand at the meeting."

In the aforementioned recorded interviews involving Redknapp and the police which were played in court on Thursday, Redknapp informed officers of a feud with Mandaric, which stemmed from the sale of Peter Crouch from Portsmouth to Aston Villa.

Redknapp allegedly said: "I was getting bigger than him [Mr Mandaric] at the football club and he didn't like it really."

The court heard Redknapp allege that his co-defendant had not wanted to sign Crouch in the first place, but that when the England international was sold for a £3 million profit, the then Portsmouth manager claimed he was entitled to 10%.

The court had already heard that Redknapp had allegedly flown to Monaco in April 2002 in the aftermath of Crouch's £4.5 million sale from Portsmouth to Aston Villa, in order open an account.

Jurors were told that Redknapp was entitled to 10% of net profits from transfers when he was appointed director of football at Portsmouth in June 2001, but this figure halved when he was appointed manager in March 2002.

The 64-year-old, of Poole, Dorset, was entitled to £115,473 under the new terms of his contract from the sale of Crouch having bought the England international for £1.25 million, but this figure would have been doubled had his contract remained unchanged.

The prosecution allege Mandaric agreed that he would secretly receive "off-record" payments hidden from tax authorities in order to make up this 5% discrepancy in Redknapp's new deal.

It was heard that in 2002, Mandaric paid $145,000 into the account and then on 13 January 2003, $100,000 moved from "Rosie 47" to a company in Miami called First Star International, following a request from Redknapp.

The prosecution claim First Star International was a personal account of Mandaric and on 21 April 2004 he wrote a personal cheque from it to Redknapp, worth a reputed $150,000.

John Black QC opened the prosecution's case on Monday by informing jurors that "both parties must have known" they were avoiding taxes, suggesting Redknapp wrote to the aforementioned Monaco bank in 2008 and requested the remaining $207,000 be transferred to his London HSBC account.

The aforementioned Tottenham manager and Milan Mandaric both deny charges of cheating the public revenue during their mutual time at Portsmouth.

The first charge alleges that Mandaric paid £93,300 into a bank account opened by Redknapp in Monaco, in order to allegedly avoid paying income tax and national insurance between April 1, 2002 and November 28, 2007.

The second charge is for the same offence between May 1, 2004, and November 28 2007, when a sum of £97,000 was allegedly paid by Mandaric into the aforementioned Monaco bank account.

The trial continues.