He was in pyjamas without shoes – Pochettino recalls first Levy meeting

Mauricio Pochettino said Daniel Levy was in his pyjamas without shoes in the afternoon when he first met the Tottenham chairman.

Pochettino was lured to Tottenham from Premier League rivals Southampton in 2014 and the Argentine manager has established Spurs as a force domestically and abroad ahead of the Champions League semi-finals.

Tottenham – third in the Premier League this season behind Manchester City and Liverpool – will host high-flying Ajax in the opening leg of their semi-final showdown in London on Tuesday.

And Pochettino, who was linked with Manchester United before Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was permanently appointed in March, lifted the lid on his first encounter with Levy and hailed the club’s achievements.

What. A. Journey.

The story of our @ChampionsLeague campaign so far…#UCL #COYS pic.twitter.com/v7v08c4wvj

— Tottenham Hotspur (@SpursOfficial) April 29, 2019

“My first meeting was in his [Daniel Levy] house, he was without shoes, like in his pyjamas but it was in the afternoon. It’s the truth,” Pochettino told reporters ahead of the Champions League clash.

“We were talking about, of course first of all, my feeling about the squad of Tottenham. And the principle objective was to try to help the club finish the training ground, to build the new stadium but being competitive. Of course, it was an ambitious project, try to in different ways to our opponents, to try to develop a project to be sure we are going to be safe on the financial side to help the club achieve what we achieved after five years and, of course, being competitive.

“That is a thing we feel the most proud [about], because we can develop two different things in football that no other club was able to do: to provide the club with the most unbelievable facilities and then put the club on the sports side in a very competitive place, reduce the gap with the top four, being competitive, being contenders and I think in three years playing in the Champions League.

“When the idea was normally to – after five years – move to the new stadium and be competitive and start thinking about one day playing in the Champions League. Look how far ahead we are. That is why after five years we must congratulate every one here. The job done is fantastic. Maybe we didn’t win a trophy still, but you don’t believe it’s maybe more than winning a trophy, what we achieved as a club? I think it’s massive.”