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How did we get Jürgen Klinsmann?

I remember Klinsmann as a small ray of light in a decade of darkness. I think that's why he's remembered so fondly.
I was born in 1987 so too young to remember the 1991 FA cup which makes him signing the first exciting thing I can remember happening to the club.
 
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After 5 mins, Mabbutt calmly says "Everyone was talking about Maradona, Ossie was talking to him, we all thought he was the one we would get".

Did we all think that?
 
Nobody thought that, as the first any fan heard of it was when it was on teletext.

We got him because Sugar was prepared to take the risk on his injury issues and mixed form whilst a group of larger clubs waited to see if they could get anyone better.
 
Bullet said:
After 5 mins, Mabbutt calmly says "Everyone was talking about Maradona, Ossie was talking to him, we all thought he was the one we would get".

Did we all think that?
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Ossie tells the story on every pre-season tour. He had Maradona all but wrapped up but something happened and they got Klinsmann instead. I'll listen better in Hong Kong this summer to get the details.
 
tommysvr said:
Ossie tells the story on every pre-season tour. He had Maradona all but wrapped up but something happened and they got Klinsmann instead. I'll listen better in Hong Kong this summer to get the details.
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I think that would've been almost too much for me to handle. The greatest player ever actually signing 9 years after first wearing our shirt...
 
thfcsteff said:
I think that would've been almost too much for me to handle. The greatest player ever actually signing 9 years after first wearing our shirt...
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@tommysvr did you ever get the further details? Wish I'd known this back when our local supporters club hosted Ossie for a night and I interviewed him (we did ask a whole bunch of good questions - this was 08/09)...if I get the chance to ask him again, I absolutely will FWIW :-)
 
thfcsteff said:
@tommysvr did you ever get the further details? Wish I'd known this back when our local supporters club hosted Ossie for a night and I interviewed him (we did ask a whole bunch of good questions - this was 08/09)...if I get the chance to ask him again, I absolutely will FWIW :-)
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It was only Ledley last pre-season unfortunately (not that I’d have remembered to ask after 300 beers :grinning:
 
DeanoAustin said:
Some of the above may be true but Klinsmann was still very highly regarded around Europe and was a top, top player. More shockingly, players of his stature didn't come to England at that time. Foreigners were of the Rosenthal/Limpar ilk. It was a fantastic signing by Sugar.
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So, I suppose signing Ossie and Ricky was an even bigger shock a few years earlier.
 
Roland Beurre said:
So, I suppose signing Ossie and Ricky was an even bigger shock a few years earlier.
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Before my time but I'd imagine it was huge in 1978 and bloody ambitious by the club.

We dared and we did when we got Greaves in the 60s, Ardiles & Villa in the 70s, Lineker and Gazza in the 80s and Jurgen in the 90s. Not sure we've dared much in the market since then.
 
DeanoAustin said:
Before my time but I'd imagine it was huge in 1978 and bloody ambitious by the club.

We dared and we did when we got Greaves in the 60s, Ardiles & Villa in the 70s, Lineker and Gazza in the 80s and Jurgen in the 90s. Not sure we've dared much in the market since then.
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The football landscape has changed dramatically since 1994 though.
 
Roland Beurre said:
So, I suppose signing Ossie and Ricky was an even bigger shock a few years earlier.
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It was huge. I was still living at home and I remember my Mum waking me up at about 7am to tell me that my mate Dave (RIP) was on the phone. He was rattling on about Spurs signing two Argentinians but still half asleep I couldn't really get my head round what he was saying. We had seen both of them in the World Cup. I think Ricky had only made a couple of substitute appearances but he stuck in my memory for a particularly brutal foul on a Brazilian player and I had told my brother "that's the sort of bloke we should be signing". Obviously he turned out not to be the hatchet man that I expected. I think it made the main news programmes and in the evening, there was a story about it on 'Nationwide' (similar to The One Show) in which Jimmy Hill was particularly negative and claimed signing overseas players would ruin English football. One unforeseen upside was that it gave me an 'in' with a rather fetching Argentinian female student at my Polytechnic
 
Bullet said:
That seems rather downbeat chaps. A bit like saying Bergkamp and Henry were flops in Italy and then that lot signed nobodies like Overmars and Anelka and Vieira and Petit and blah blah blah negative spin....

I remember being ecstatic when Spurs signed Klinsmann out of the blue, and him being a massive influence on the pitch. Very hard working, intelligent, knitted play, scored goals, got us on the TV and in the papers, huge positive impact when we needed it.
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He brought the best out of barmby, anderton and Teddy. He was also very much a star attraction and upped our public image a lot as part of the famous five.
 
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