Harry Redknapp has signed hundreds of players across nearly 35 years in management. Some have been good and others not so, but there is one who stands out as the all-time worst signing. That man is Marco Boogers, who had a very short, but incredibly memorable, stint at West Ham in the 1990s.
The striker spent his entire career in his native Netherlands except for a few months in east London. Redknapp was West Ham's manager when he watched some videos of Boogers in the Eredivisie before signing him for around £850,000 from Sparta Rotterdam in 1995. Had 'Arry watched Boogers in the flesh, he might have saved his pennies rather than splashing out.
“I could have gone to Napoli or Everton, and Borussia Dortmund wanted me as well,” the player said after arriving at the club. “But suddenly West Ham came in. That was a beautiful club to me, with the famous colours alone.
So I chose West Ham.” Boogers ended up having one of the most memorable debuts in Premier League history, starting with a crunching tackle on Gary Neville. Manchester United star Neville was only 20 years old, in what was set to be his first campaign as a starter, but Boogers, not long off the bench, sent the youngster flying, getting a red card just moments into his second appearance in the English game.
Boogers insisted that he slipped on the wet grass but TV replays suggest otherwise, as he wiped the right-back out at full pelt and sparked a melee with the United squad. It led to back pages with the words.