Jordan hopeful of Redknapp return

Tottenham boss Harry Redknapp is likely to return to the dugout for Monday’s clash with Aston Villa, according to assistant Joe Jordan.

After undergoing heart surgery, the former West Ham and Portsmouth manager missed his Tottenham’s Europa League trip to Rubin Kazan on October 3 and English Premier League match against Fulham three days later.

But after following the international break, Jordan revealed Redknapp is optimistic about his chances to return to the bench on Monday.

“It will depend on his conversation with the medical people who will give him advice, but he’s feeling good, he sounds good and I would think there is a possibility he will be back for the Villa game,” Jordan said.

“The way he sounds, he’s very keen and optimistic that will happen.”

Since heavy defeats in their first two Premier League fixtures of the new campaign, Spurs have enjoyed a run of eight league matches without defeat.

Their seven victories for the campaign have lifted them to fifth place on 22 points, having played a game less than their rivals following the postponement of their opening-day clash with Everton.

Jordan said forward Rafael van der Vaart had ‘a chance’ of lining up against Villa on Monday, despite tweaking his hamstring for the Netherlands against Sweden on Friday.

“Rafa trained on Wednesday and from what the medical team are saying he’s at 75 percent,” Jordan said.

“That’s good, but we have to get him from 75 percent to 100 percent, we’ll have take it day to day and we do have a few days with the game on Monday.”

“He’s got a chance, but it is important that there is no recurrence of the injury.”

Jordan said that while the club is still assessing the fitness of various players who have recently returned from international duty, there were no other major doubts ahead of Monday’s clash.