Harry Redknapp has admitted to liking the looks of Stephane Sessegnon and Hatem Ben Arfa before they became Sunderland and Newcastle players respectively, with the Tottenham man admitting 'you can't have every player'.

Both Sessegnon and Ben Arfa have starred for their respective clubs since moving to England, and meanwhile Redknapp made moves for Jermain Defoe and Rafael van der Vaart instead.

And while Tottenham and Newcastle in particular go from strength to strength this season, Redknapp revealed that he could have taken either player on board, but people behind the scenes at Spurs weren't so keen on Sessegnon.

"The people who work for me weren't really convinced [over Sessegnon] at the time," he told Sky Sports.

"They were watching him and they didn't feel that he was any better than what we had, in all honesty.

Harry Redknapp
Harry Redknapp says he could have taken Stephane Sessegnon and Hatem Ben Arfa to Tottenham.

"We still had Pavlyuchenko here, and Defoe. But he is a talent, there's no doubt about that, a really good player in behind the striker."

Redknapp also made the sensational claim that he could have signed Ben Arfa for Tottenham, who has now fully recovered from injury at Newcastle, but he doesn't think the star would make the cut.

He continued: "The boy at Newcastle's a good player as well, he's a talent, Ben Arfa. He's similar, another good little dribbler.

"We probably could have had him as well, but you can't take everyone can you? You end up with dozens of players hanging around, and we've got good players here anyway so he might not have got in our team."

Redknapp insists that he doesn't regret not bringing Sessegnon to Tottenham, saying: "He's a good little player, but I've got Van der Vaart. You're just going to cause yourself a bigger problem.

"Rafa plays there, really, in behind the striker, and he's not going to be happy sitting around and not playing.

"Rafa scores goals and makes goals. He's a top player, so you can't just say, 'oh I'll have him, and him'. Some football clubs end up with too many and all you have is problems."