Sevilla coach Juande Ramos has said he received a "dizzying" offer to take charge at Tottenham Hotspur but never considered accepting the approach from the English club.
"They made an excellent, dizzying offer, but I'm under contract to Sevilla and my decision is to fulfil it," Ramos told a news conference yesterday.
"There was not the slightest possibility that I would accept it because I'm under contract. It did not interest me or the club. I wasn't in a meeting with anyone, what happened was that I met with a person and that person went on to meet other people who were surely Tottenham," said Ramos, who led Sevilla to UEFA Cup victory last season.
Tottenham yesterday issued a statement denying they have offered the position of manager to anyone while Martin Jol has been in the job.
Spurs said they had not offered Jol's job to anyone and that "it is wholly inaccurate and inappropriate to suggest otherwise."
Jol and his assistant Chris Hughton met with Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy, sporting director Damien Comolli and other board members on Tuesday following the reports linking Ramos with Spurs.
Ramos has been linked with a possible move to the Premier League club ever since media reports suggested that manager Jol no longer enjoyed the confidence of club chairman Daniel Levy.
Speculation went into overdrive when the Seville sports paper Estadio Deportivo published photographs of an alleged meeting between Ramos and Tottenham club secretary John Alexander at a hotel in the Andalucian city.
"I am an ambitious chairman, we are an ambitious club and we want Champions League football at White Hart Lane," Levy said late on Tuesday. "We, the board, owe it to the club and the supporters to constantly assess our position and performance."
Ramos has guided Sevilla to five trophies in the last two seasons, including back-to-back UEFA Cups and the King's Cup.
His side crushed Real Madrid 5-3 on Sunday to complete a 6-3 aggregate win in the Spanish Super Cup and play AC Milan in the European Super Cup next week.
They also have one foot in the Champions League group stage after a 2-0 win over AEK Athens in first leg of their third qualifying round tie.
"We are in the middle of a great project with Sevilla and there is still work to do," Ramos told the news conference.
When quizzed on media reports that Chelsea had told former Real Madrid coach Fabio Capello they wanted Ramos to take charge at the end of the season, he replied: "I've no knowledge of that situation."
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