Sandro reveals how Assou-Ekotto threatened to kill Van der Vaart and explains how Arsenal legend talked him into signing for Tottenham
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Former Tottenham midfielder Sandro spoke exclusively to Ladbrokes and recalled a great anecdote about defender Benoit Assou-Ekoto.
Assou-Ekotto threatened to kill Van der Vaart after free-kick bust-up
Benoit Assou-Ekotto is a crazy guy, he really is. We liked him a lot. We knew he was a particular kind of guy, but we liked him because of it. He never used to know who we were playing on a weekend…he just didn’t like football.
There’s a really funny moment that springs to my mind when I think about Assou-Ekotto. He used to like to take free-kicks for us. But one time we were playing in a game, we got a free-kick in a good position and Rafael van der Vaart picked up the ball and decided to shoot.
Assou took this very personally. He was very upset because, to him, that was his ball. He was going to shoot. As a group of guys playing with him, generally whenever Assou wanted to do something, we just left him to it…let him do it, you know?
In this moment, he was mad. At half-time, we get into the dressing room and he’s punching Rafael! I tried to grab hold of him, he was so strong as well, so I’m grabbing holding of him and dragging him back because he’s trying to attack Rafa.
“Why did you take the shot? Why did you do this? It’s my ball, my friend… you don’t take it! Next time, I kill you!”
He was so angry. The next day, we turn up to training and Van der Vaart comes over to me and says “Sandro, you saved my life…thank you very much!”
Gilberto Silva convinced me to join Tottenham while on Brazil duty
Gilberto Silva spoke to me a lot when I first broke into the Brazil senior team. He had so many positive things to say about the Premier League. He’d heard that Tottenham wanted to buy me, and he said “Sandro, you must go because it’s a different level altogether, and for us midfielders, it’s the best league in the world.”
He told me how intense the game was over in England, and I always wanted to play in the Premier League one day. I can always remember him just saying to me “Go, Sandro, go!” And he was an Arsenal player!
To be honest, at that early stage in my career, being with the national team and being surrounded by these kind of players, I just used to think I was dreaming. I’ve always said that, because when you are there, sharing a dressing room with your dream players…there’s just nothing you can do to make it feel real. You look around and you try to just sit back, say nothing, watch them and take it all in.
And then all of a sudden, Gilberto comes over to speak to me, and gives me advice about moving to the Premier League and signing for Tottenham.
“You must go, because I just know you’re going to love it.”
And I’m just sat thinking ‘wow. Gilberto Silva is telling me what to do.’ He gave me his time, and I was very honoured, even though he was my team-mate at the time for Brazil. This is a World Cup winner, a Premier League legend, a guy who plays in my position. A guy I loved, and looked up to. It was such a strange situation because he knew about me, about my game, and about the Tottenham rumours. And the fact he was trying to give me advice, it just felt like a dream. The whole experience was just so strange.
It’s funny because it wasn’t just Gilberto who made me feel that way. I’d be looking around the dressing room at all of these huge names. Ronaldinho, Adriano, Robinho, Maicon, Julio Cesar, Lucio…it was crazy for me! I was always showing my friends pictures I’d taken with those guys. I used to get asked all the time what the guys did off the pitch, did they joke around? Did they talk to me? All of these things, but they were really normal, to be honest. They laughed, they enjoyed their company. They liked to play music and have fun. Ronaldinho was always smiling – these are crazy, crazy moments in my life that I still have to sometimes remind myself about.
