Former Hammers player and manager Harry Redknapp says West Ham exit comments are the biggest regret of his life.
Redknapp enjoyed a golden spell managing West Ham between 1994 and 2001 having played 175 times for the club as a winger.
The boyhood Hammer came through the club’s famed academy with the likes of immortal West Ham legend Bobby Moore.
Redknapp had a 37% win percentage as West Ham manager and brought some fantastic – and some not so fantastic – players to east London, playing attractive, attacking football along the way.
The manager turned TV personality and pundit oversaw the emergence of West Ham’s golden generation of young talent into the first team.
From Rio Ferdinand, Frank Lampard and Jermain Defoe to Michael Carrick, Glen Johnson and Joe Cole, West Ham appeared to be on the brink of becoming a force.
But when Ferdinand was sold to Leeds for a then record £18million, things started to unravel for the club and Redknapp.
He infamously criticised his boss, then West Ham owner Terence Brown, in an interview with the club’s fanzine.
And it ended up costing Redknapp his dream job.
Redknapp went on to enjoy success at the likes of Portsmouth and Spurs. But he also sullied his name somewhat with Hammers fans for taking over at bitter rivals Tottenham.
Now the ex Hammers boss has been speaking to one of his former star players, Cole, in an interview for BT Sport.
And Redknapp says the West Ham exit comments are the biggest regret of his life.
“Probably writing something nasty about Terry Brown, the West Ham chairman at the time, in a fanzine,” Redknapp said when asked by Cole what one thing he would change from his career.
“Unfortunately that, even worse, he’d read.
“And that was probably the end of me there (West Ham).”
Conversely Redknapp said making his West Ham debut against Sunderland was the highlight of his football career.
It is not the first time Redknapp has opened up on those comments about Brown.
He has previously said getting sacked by West Ham left him ‘choked’.