Glenn Hoddle

Glenn Hoddle (born 27 October 1957) is an English former football player and manager.

He currently works as a television pundit and commentator for ITV Sport and TNT Sports.

He is deemed to be one of the most gifted and creative English footballers of his generation.

He played as a midfielder for Tottenham Hotspur, Monaco, Chelsea and Swindon Town and at international level for England.

Hoddle was born on 27 October 1957 in Hayes, Middlesex to Derek Hoddle and Teresa Roberts.

Soon after, the family moved to Harlow, Essex.

Teresa Roberts established herself within the local darts community as the mixed double's partner of the local legend Rod Kingham who was also from Harlow He attended Burnt Mill School in Harlow.

He has been supporting Tottenham Hotspur since he was eight, and his favourite player was Martin Chivers.

He first came to the attention of Spurs when Chivers and Ray Evans went to present prizes at a local school cup final and noticed the potential of the 11-year-old schoolboy, and on Chivers' recommendation he was invited to train with the club at Tottenham's practice ground in Cheshunt.

At the age of 15, Hoddle played for Harlow-based Sunday league club Longmans alongside his father.

In the following season Tottenham retained the FA Cup (Hoddle scored in both the Final and Final replay) against Queen's Park Rangers and finished the League campaign in fourth place, the club's best league position since 1971.

Hoddle performed as the midfield fulcrum in many of these successes and also contributed magnificently as the team reached the final of the League Cup, losing 3–1 to Liverpool, and the semi-final stage of the European Cup Winners Cup.

Hoddle joined the club as a junior when he was 12, and signed for the club as an apprentice on 17 April 1974.

He successfully overcame knee problems in his early teens and collected eight England Youth caps, the first of these on 18 March 1975 against Spain.

He made his Spurs first-team debut as a 17-year-old substitute for Cyril Knowles against Norwich City on 30 August 1975, a game that ended 2–2.

Between 1975 and 1987, the gifted playmaker scored 110 goals in 490 first-team matches in all competitions, only four players (Steve Perryman, Pat Jennings, Gary Mabbutt and Cyril Knowles) have made more appearances in a Spurs shirt.

At international level, Hoddle won 44 caps for England during his Tottenham career.

Hoddle was forced to wait until 21 February 1976 to start a First Division match and immediately announced his arrival with the winning goal, a spectacular strike past Stoke City and England goalkeeper Peter Shilton.

He flourished under the management of Keith Burkinshaw and despite the club's relegation to the Second Division in 1976–77 after 27 seasons of First Division football, a Hoddle-inspired Spurs side won promotion to the top flight at the first attempt.

As Tottenham's transitional phase continued, Hoddle's international career began on 15 December 1976 in an Under-21 friendly fixture against Wales.

He would collect another eleven caps at that level, and play twice for the England 'B' team prior to scoring on his full international debut against Bulgaria on 22 November 1979.

The 1979–80 campaign heralded the emergence of Hoddle as a top-class player; the 22-year-old midfielder scored 19 goals in 41 league appearances and was awarded the PFA Young Player of the Year award at the end of the season.

In 1981, he starred as Spurs won the FA Cup for the sixth time, defeating Manchester City after a replay.

During the summer of 1982, Hoddle played in two of England's matches in the opening group phase of the FIFA World Cup, starting against Kuwait after a substitute appearance in a 2–0 victory over Czechoslovakia.

In October 1983, he helped Spurs win 6–2 on aggregate against a Feyenoord Rotterdam side containing Johan Cruyff.

Cruyff was dismissive of Hoddle before their first match, but after Hoddle's performance, Cruyff swapped shirts with Hoddle as a sign of respect.

Hoddle's uncle, Dave, was part of the Stansted team that won the 1984 FA Vase.

Hoddle's involvement in the following three seasons was limited by a number of niggling injury problems (he started only 76 of a possible 126 league matches) but nevertheless, Hoddle proved to be the architect behind the team's 1984 UEFA Cup triumph despite missing the Final due to fitness concerns.

Spurs came close to further honours in the next three seasons, reaching third place in the First Division and the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup in 1984–85 and another FA Cup Final in 1987, losing 3–2 to Coventry City, the only time the North London club has experienced defeat in the final of the famous knock-out competition.

The unexpected loss to the Midlands side was Hoddle's last match for Spurs as newly appointed AS Monaco manager Arsène Wenger brought him to the principality for a fee of £750,000.

Hoddle announced in 1987 that he would be leaving Tottenham Hotspur at the end of the season to pursue a career overseas where his style of play would be appreciated by continental managers and supporters, and to play European level football with English clubs banned after the Heysel disaster.

He joined AS Monaco alongside George Weah and fellow Englishman Mark Hateley and immediately inspired the club to the 1988 Ligue 1 championship, its first league title in six seasons.

Hoddle was voted the Best Foreign Player in French football and helped to guide the team to the quarter-finals of the European Cup in the 1988–89 campaign.

Arsène Wenger, later the manager of Arsenal, was the coach who brought him to Monaco.

He managed England to the second round of the 1998 FIFA World Cup, where they lost to Argentina on penalties.

He was dismissed from the England job in 1999 for a newspaper interview in which he was widely interpreted as saying that people with disabilities and others are affected by karma from past lives.

He said that his words were "misconstrued, misunderstood and misinterpreted" and that disabled people had his "overwhelming support, care, consideration and dedication".

In 2007, he was inducted into the National Football Museum Hall of Fame, which cited him as one of the most gifted and creative English footballers of his generation, exhibiting "sublime balance and close control, unrivalled passing and vision and extraordinary shooting ability, both from open play and set pieces".

He was also known for his tactical intelligence and work-rate.

He has been manager of Swindon Town (earning promotion to the Premier League), Chelsea (taking them to the FA Cup final), Southampton, Tottenham Hotspur (reaching a League Cup final) and Wolverhampton Wanderers.