While Benoit Assou-Ekotto will never go down in Premier League folklore as a top-class full-back, he has certainly been a colourful figure in the top-flight over the last number of years with his brutal honesty. Stating in the past that he 'plays for the money', and that 'football was not a passion', the Cameroonian left-back has perversely endeared himself to the Spurs faithful for his unabashed frankness. Farmed out on loan to Queens Park Rangers at the moment, his best days are surely behind him, but in his heyday, Assou-Ekotto was a solid and useful asset for the North London club. However, judging by his first forays into English football, littered with a nervous and tepid energy, one would never have predicted he would have been pulling on the jersey over 150 times for the club. Arriving from from Lens in 2006, Assou-Ekotto struggled with the language barrier, and a long-term injury sustained in December led to ordinary full-back Lee Young-Pyo keeping his place for the next 18 months. However, while the knee injury led to Assou-Ekotto playing just once over the next year and a half, the Cameroonian owes the success of his Spurs career to what he perceived to be a blessing in disguise.
''When your surgeon tells you maybe you won't play football anymore many things are different in your mind. Before, when you're injured, your money comes into your account every month and everything is cool. But when they speak to you about the end of your career at 22 or 23 - it's why maybe I changed. I'm safe now but this gave me a lesson. That's why I changed many things in my mind and in my life.'' - Benoit Assou-Ekotto, February 2011.
Upon Harry Redknapp's arrival in the autumn of 2008, Assou-Ekotto was welcomed back from the exile imposed by the previous manager. Finally, the White Hart Lane faithful could witness the hard-working talents in a rich vein of form, earning plaudits from his boss for keeping a certain Cristiano Ronaldo quiet in the 2009 League Cup final. He'll be turning 31 this season, so it's no surprise that the North London club have concentrated on younger left-back talent in Danny Rose and Ben Davies, but there will always be a special compartment in the heart of each Spurs supporter for the brutally honest, but lung-busting efficient full-back from Cameroon.
Recent Journalism & New Media graduate. Insatiable thirst for all things football, and hopes to break into the field of sports journalism in the near future.
Have made a significantly insignificant playing career out of receiving several slaps around the head for not passing the ball.
