'You never said sorry!' - Vorm on Dembele & AZ incident

Our former goalkeeper Michel Vorm has revealed a bruising first interaction he had with our former midfielder Mousa Dembele.

Moving from Swansea City to N17 in the summer of 2014, Michel became team-mates with the fabled Mousa for the first time in his career, but it wasn't the first time they had met.

Having both played almost 10 seasons of professional football by that summer, the pair had already faced each other, most notably during their time in the Netherlands where Michel was at Utrecht (2005-2011) and Mousa was with Thursday night's Europa League opponents AZ Alkmaar (2006-2010) - and one of those meetings has never been forgotten by our former midfielder after he came out worse off following a collision with the shot stopper.

According to Michel, the incident happened as he leaped to collect a ball from a cross. However, with his knee up to protect himself, he collided with the onrunning Mousa 'hard', leaving him winded.

So, years later, when the pair eventually became team-mates in north London, Mousa was quick to remind our former goalkeeper of that clash, especially as he was still waiting for an apology!

Speaking to our Official Matchday Programme ahead of our huge clash with AZ, Michel jovially recalled, "There was one game when we were playing against AZ and Mousa Dembélé was playing for them.

"There was a cross put in and Mousa came towards me and I jumped to get the ball with one knee up to protect myself. We collided. I hit Mousa so hard and he was winded. It wasn’t good.

"Years later, when we were playing together for Spurs, he said ‘do you remember what you did to me in that match all those years ago… and you never said sorry!’"

A player who had two stints with us, first between 2014 and 2019 - a period in which he helped us to the Champions League Final, A League Cup Final and two FA Cup semi-finals - he then rejoined us midway through the 2019/20 campaign following a serious injury to Hugo Lloris and would finish his career at the Club.

Announcing his retirement in October, 2020, the goalkeeper returned to N17 for a third time in April, 2021, as he became our Goalkeeper Coach as Ryan Mason took up interim charge of the team.

Later this month, he will be back at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium for a fourth time as he lines up for our Legends team in an enticing exhibition match against AC Milan Glorie - a game which is being played in aid of our Foundation.

"It’s going to be amazing," Michel said as he looked ahead to returning to the pitch. "If you see the squads, there are some great players involved on both teams. I know it’s going to be a very competitive match.

"I don’t play football at all these days, so it will be great to play again. It’s also going to be brilliant to see familiar faces, good friends."