The Sun can today reveal SIXTEEN first-team stars coughed up £2,000 each to party organiser Robbie Keane for the wild night out after Redknapp had allowed them to go on what he believed was a golf trip.
But the shamed players abused that privilege, with six of them even hiring a private jet to fly there and back.
They arrived in Dublin last Tuesday and spent the night partying in a bar and a nightclub before flying back the following day.
The party came just four days before Champions League-chasing Spurs lost 1-0 at home to struggling Wolves and is a major embarrassment to Redknapp, who only last Friday insisted there would be no Christmas party for his players.
Redknapp, however, said last night the players had told him they were going to Dublin for a golf trip.
He said: "Wednesday was their day off and Robbie told me they were going to Ireland to play golf. I had no problem with that.
"However, it is widely known that I do not approve of Christmas parties and I've always made it clear players should only drink in moderation.
"Whatever happened in Ireland, I do not accept it had any effect on the result against Wolves.
"The squad trained brilliantly on Thursday and Friday and there were other reasons why we lost that match.
"On Wednesday this week, when we beat Man City 3-0, you could see the true character and talent in this team."
The objective? To get the entire Spurs squad to Dublin for a wild Christmas party and back again while maintaining the fiction that it was just a golf trip.
Skipper Robbie Keane - the mastermind behind the plan - had been on reconnaissance many times to Ireland's capital city.
It was, after all, his birthplace and he was familiar with the lie of the land. He discreetly collected £2,000 in cash from each player to pay for the celebrations and on Tuesday last week, when training finished at Spurs' Chigwell headquarters, Operation Christmas Knees-up swung into action.
Jonathan Woodgate and five team-mates hired a Citation 2 luxury private jet costing £5,200 from AD Aviation and flew out of Stansted executive terminal. And they paid out again for another one from London Aviation to get them back.
Meanwhile, the rest of the squad clambered aboard scheduled flights. Sixteen senior players made the trip while four did not, those being Wilson Palacios, Roman Pavlyuchenko, Gareth Bale and Giovani Dos Santos.
The 16 met up late on Tuesday afternoon and some started drinking in Gibneys in Malahide which is about 10 miles out of Dublin and one of Keane's favourite haunts.
They then moved on into the city to the Jackson Court Hotel. Attached to the hotel is Copper Face Jacks nightclub, which is open seven nights a week so all entertainment is on tap if required.
Reviews of the hotel on the internet observe that it is not the place to stay if you want a good night's sleep because the rooms are over the nightclub which doesn't close until 4am.
One described the club as "pretty sleazy" while another said the noise from the music was "incredible". Even the hotel describes itself as "lively" and Tottenham's squad were clearly not going to let them down.
They may, however, have let their manager down. Because less than 48 hours after their return to England, Redknapp was publicly explaining just why Spurs players would NOTbe having any Christmas parties this year.
Redknapp declared that footballers' parties were "too much aggro" and pointedly added: "I don't think my players would take the liberty of having one without asking me first."
Well, they did have one and they didn't ask. The more you examine Redknapp's views on the subject the easier it is to understand how angry the manager will be at having been deceived.
He continued: "The only advice I have about a Christmas party is don't have one. "I don't see the point because they're nothing but aggravation for everybody. "Everyone's waiting for you to trip up, go out and get drunk or act silly. You don't need that.
"It's a long season and at the end of that, if we are successful and achieve something at Tottenham, they can go and have a party. They can go and enjoy their break in the summer.
"This is a busy period, a working period. Why should we have Christmas parties? Every year there's aggro at every football club that has one. "If they tell me they're having a Christmas party, I'll tell them they're not having one. "I want to see them enjoy themselves but not at this time of year. They've got nothing to celebrate. "They have to maintain their fitness and be prepared for a tough programme coming up.
"One thing they don't need is to get a load of booze down their neck." Now the squad is living in fear of Redknapp's retribution once he finds out all the details of the Dublin trip.
He warned his players earlier in the season that he did not expect to hear any reports of them going out partying. Redknapp was furious when he saw pictures of Peter Crouch and Woodgate in a nightclub after a game at Portsmouth.
Even so, as a Spurs insider told SunSport: "The players were determined to have a Christmas party and, being Irish, Robbie thought Dublin would be a great place to have it. "It's amazing they thought they could get away with it."
By coincidence Bolton players were staying in Malahide the same week and a Reebok source said: "One or two of our lads bumped into some of the Tottenham players over in Dublin.
"We heard the Spurs lads were heading for a nightclub called Copper Face Jacks. "But they said they were going back to London early the next day.
"It caused a fair amount of amusement when we heard that Harry Redknapp had banned them from having a Christmas party - as we thought that they'd already had it."
harry tio pawned?
Spurs tio pawned.
Robbie Keane could be stripped of the Tottenham captaincy over the players' party antics last week.
The Sun says Tottenham boss Harry Redknapp was fuming when he discovered 16 members of his squad defied him by flying to Dublin last week for a wild night out.
Now he is set to fine every one of them on Monday - and could even strip Robbie Keane of the captaincy.
Redknapp said: "I told my players I didn't want them having one and I don't see why they should happen in today's football."
All tio exposed....
Keane tio stripped.
Robbie Keane's future at Tottenham is in doubt.
The Daily Mail says Keane's future at Tottenham was thrown into further doubt when manager Harry Redknapp admitted that he wants Peter Crouch and Jermain Defoe to continue their partnership up front.
Keane is facing an awkward day on Monday too when Redknapp investigates his players' secret Christmas party, which was arranged by the Ireland striker without the manager's permission.
When asked if it would be difficult to break up the Crouch-Defoe partnership, Redknapp - who favours using two up front not three - said: "Of course. They have done really well. The goal when they combined against Manchester City in midweek was a classic case of the big'un and the little'un.
"All the football we played and the fantastic passing movements, then we had one ball from Gomes, Crouch gets up for a great header and Defoe is feeding off it and it's in the back of the net.
"That is route-one football at its best. In general we pass the ball unbelievably but sometimes that is just as effective. That is what you look for in a partnership when you have a giant and a little'un."
i just thought that, since rafael is looking for a striker, robbie seems to be able to fill in the boot.
afterall, he had been with us before, and shown that he can do the job.
ooo Keane .....
Aston Villa and Celtic are also keen on the 29-year-old Republic of Ireland striker, but Steve Bruce's Black Cats have the ready cash for a deal at around £12million.
Spurs boss Harry Redknapp has long been considering selling Keane but the player's lead role in an unsanctioned Dublin Christmas party has made up his mind.
Keane, who is likely to be stripped of the club captaincy, faces a heavy fine along with all the 16 Spurs players who defied Redknapp's party-ban by organising the jaunt.
Sunderland were close to making a move for Keane last summer but Spurs said no after their bid for West Ham's Carlton Cole fell through. If Keane departs this time, Cole is still top of Tottenham's wanted list.
Keane who re-joined Spurs from Liverpool last January for a basic £12 million fee would command a similar amount. Sunderland could meet that but Villa would have to sell to afford him.
Celtic retain a strong interest but would try and loan the player initially which would not suit Spurs.
Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy has made it clear that Redknapp must fund new signings with sales this January.
On the basis Redknapp wants two new forwards, he is also prepared to off load Roman Pavlyuchenko, probably back to Russian club Zenit St Petersburg, to boost his forward line as Spurs seek to kick on from their strong start and secure Champions League football.
Along with Cole the strikers that interest Tottenham are Bordeaux's Marouane Chamakh, Andre-Pierre Gignac of Tolouse, Wigan's Hugo Rodallega and former Portsmouth forward Lomana Lua-Lua now playing in Qatar.
if robbie go AV den AV is a veri veri strong team liao
I kind of feel this will just blow over after a while, just a bunch of colleagues want to have a night out on the town. Not the first time you hear stories about teams having parties and all. At least this time you don't hear of anything bad that happened during the party or that it got out of hand.
Originally posted by Poignant:i just thought that, since rafael is looking for a striker, robbie seems to be able to fill in the boot.
afterall, he had been with us before, and shown that he can do the job.
It will be a joke of the century if Liverpool buy him again...