Former Celtic star Paolo Di Canio was battered by cops with truncheons for trying to sneak into a Spandau Ballet gig, Harry Redknapp has revealed.
The Italian striker has always been a massive fan of the 80s band, and went to a Spandau gig in his home city of Rome.
The 52-year-old played for Celtic in 1996, the Hammers between 1999 and 2003, Sheffield Wednesday and Charlton - and went on to manage Swindon Town and Sunderland.
Harry Redknapp - Di Canio’s former boss at West Ham - said the player always pumped out Spandau Ballet tunes - like Gold, True and Through and Barricades - in his car.
Harry, speaking to Spandau’s former frontman Tony Hadley on his Stars Car Guitars podcast today (Fri), revealed how Paolo was such a massive fan of the band he tried to ‘clamber’ over a wall into a stadium in Rome to see them.
The 74-year-old former Spurs and Portsmouth manager told Tony: “Paolo Di Canio…he is Spandau Ballet barmy and has been his whole life.
“You get in his car and it’s Spandau Ballet - it’s all his used to listen to, he absolutely loves you Tony.”
Speaking about when Paolo tried to get into a Spandau gig in Rome, Harry added: “They (Spandau Ballet) went to Rome.”
Putting on an Italian accent, Harry - pretending to be Paolo - said: “The first a day I bought the ticket and went (to the show).
“They decided to do a second day…I’m climbing over the wall, but I have no ticket…they are hitting me with truncheons and trying to pull me down.”
Tony piped up: “I don’t even listen to myself, he (Paolo) makes up for it!!”
He then told how the Italian player turned up at a Spandau gig in Italy during the band’s 2014/15 reunion tour - and brought the band 24 bottles of fine wine and even paid for his own ticket.
Tony, 60, said: “When we did our last reunion tour in 2014/15, we were in Italy and we got a message that Paolo Di Canio wanted to come.
“He bought a ticket and I said to him ‘Why did you buy a ticket? Your people could have contacted my people’, and he said ‘No, no I buy ticket’.
“And he brought bottles of fine, fine wine - there must have been 12 bottles of beautiful red wine and 12 bottles of beautiful white wine.
“We said ‘honestly Paolo you didn’t need to to that’, and he said ‘No, no I do it for you…I love Spandau .”
