Scott Brown has revealed he turned down at least two lucrative moves to the English Premier League earlier in his career.
The Celtic captain has written himself into Hoops folklore after lifting 22 trophies during his 14-year stay at Parkhead, and will undoubtedly go down as a modern-day legend after playing his final match for the club this weekend.
But things could've gone very differently for Brown, and Celtic, had he decided to pursue the opportunity to play down south, with the 35-year-old revealing Harry Redknapp was an admirer during his time as Tottenham Hotspur manager.
Speaking via Sky Sports ahead of his last outing as a Celtic player, Brown explained: "I had an offer from Spurs, from Harry Redknapp, but it was too soon for myself. I think I wanted to come to Celtic, I wanted to enjoy it.
"I was starting to really enjoy my football at the club and they put a lot of faith into me, especially during hard times as well, and they stuck by me so it was great to give a little bit back and Neil was the manager at the time.
"I had an opportunity to go to Newcastle and I was out of contract but Lenny was like: 'I want to keep you as captain, I want to build the team around you, I think we can push on and keep this winning mentality going'.
"We were doing quite well at the time and it was one of those things. I was thinking 'do I want to talk and stay at Celtic, do I want to go down [to England] and have a fresh start, or do I want to keep winning and show everyone that I am a good player, that I can keep winning and deal with this'.
"That was the little bit of fight inside me that I wanted to prove everybody wrong and it's stuck by me for the last 10-11 years.
"There have been a lot of people writing me off and I want to show people that I've still got another few years and I'll continue [thinking] like that until I retire."
Brown isn't specific about the timing of the offers but Redknapp cemented Spurs as a top-four club in the English top-flight, and led the north London club to the quarter-finals of the Champions League in 2011 with a squad that consisted of players such as Gareth Bale, Rafael van der Vaart and Luka Modric.
