Most people involved in football, whether chairmen, managers, agents or even fans find the transfer window a desperate combination of intense frustration and last minute panic. It’s just as well the end of the window corresponds with an international break so that all concerned can have the chance to go and lie down in a darkened room to unscramble their minds and think about what they did in the final 24 hours.
Not so Daniel Levy, the Tottenham Chairman who has bestrode this transfer window like a colossus, controlling not only the fate of his own players and those he wishes to acquire but also frustrating the attempts of other clubs, not least his North London neighbours Arsenal from getting the transfer targets that they wanted in time.
Levy of course has a strong reputation as a tough negotiator coming from his exploits in past windows, particularly with the transfer of Dimitar Berbatov to Man United, holding it up to the very last moment to gain the maximum fee possible before he released his star player. The last two summers have seen Levy on form again with his refusal to countenance the sale of Luca Modric to Chelsea despite the player’s refusing to play in a Spurs match, and ultimately only allowing him to leave on the club’s terms to Real Madrid the following year. But all this has just been a warmup for the serious business this summer.
Daniel Levy has a fascinating chart with no less than six planets in Aquarius, making him an extremely cool rational operator, not prone to emotional decisions with a strong sense of detachment. Aquarius is the most common sign amongst great military leaders as it seems to give them the capacity to remain calm but clear under intense pressure and to make logical decisions based on good strategy rather than as a feeling response to the pressure of the situation.
Levy also has the Moon in Aries which makes him very assertive and gives him the capacity to act quickly if need be and to be relatively untroubled by the feelings of other people. It’s not a placing of someone who would suffer fools gladly.
Perhaps the most significant thing in his chart is the extremely close conjunction between the Sun and Jupiter bringing him great success in business and enlarging pretty much anything he touches. This conjunction is the closest thing that you can get to an astrological Midas touch.
With all that Aquarius and also the Suns opposition to Uranus, Levy has the ability to think laterally and to operate in unconventional way and is not one to be held back by other people’s barriers or the restraining hand of authority. He needs and demands the freedom to operate in the way he wants to and will not tolerate being told what to do by anyone. Even the biggest and wealthiest clubs in the world like Real Madrid, Man United and Roman Abramovich’s Chelsea just end up doing what they’re told.
Part of Daniel Levy’s Aquarius collection is a very close conjunction between Mars and Saturn. This can be quite a difficult aspect to have when young but as one gets older and gains more experience it can be a very powerful controlling factor.
The classic astrological interpretation of this aspect is like driving a car with one foot on the accelerator and the other on the brake. Levy, of course has perfected the skill of knowing when to use both as he drives his transfer negotiations and if you have control of both pedals the only thing that your opponent can operate is the clutch which on its own has no impact. So Levy is in a position to control most of the negotiations instinctively knowing when to push forward, when to stop and hold back and his Moon in Aries would insist on gripping the steering wheel as well.
Saturn is the planet of limitation and this summer it has been around 5 to 6° Scorpio causing all kinds of problems for many of the top managers in the Premier League particularly David Moyes and Arsene Wenger as Saturn has been opposite Moyes’ Sun and conjunct Wengers’ Moon for much of the time.
Saturn has also been in square to Levy’s Mars but because Mars is conjunct Saturn in his birth chart he is used to operating within its constraints and so what might have been seen as a potential hazard becomes a great advantage in transfer negotiations.
In many ways the Mars / Saturn conjunction is nicely symbolic of the football transfer window itself as Mars represents the tremendous drive to get out there and hit your targets and Saturn creates a restricted framework particularly one bound by time. Levy, because he has this conjunction in his birthchart has plenty of natural experience operating under these conditions and this summer, with Saturn coming to square his birth Mars / Saturn conjunction, he became a master controller of the whole window. Or at least not quite the whole window as Saturn moved away from his conjunction towards the end of the month.
One problem with exact timing is that Levy’s birth time is not available. What is known is that Pluto has been square to his Moon over the last couple of years and this transit has undoubtedly been his big moment in terms of emerging as a major player. Pluto’s transits generally mark significant watersheds in a person’s life and the last two years has seen his reputation grow exponentially. Uranus has also been in conjunction to the same Moon for over a year strengthening his powers considerably.
Despite the absence of a birth time it looks as if there was a small gap at the end of August that wasn’t quite covered by Saturn, Uranus or Pluto. Of course by this point Tottenham had largely acquired all their transfer targets and Real Madrid had finally managed prize Levy’s fingers open enough to place €100 million into his hand. Some people have said that part of the delay for the Bale transfer was to hold up other club’s attempts to take Madrid players for themselves. Even the richest club in the world would have to recoup some of the cash and selling the likes of Mesut Ozil to anyone that would be prepared to stump up half of the Bale money would be a necessary part of the equation. Levy probably recognised this but by the end of August even the imperial powers granted him by Pluto, Uranus and Saturn were beginning to wane so he could not prevent Ozil’s last minute transfer to his North London rivals, Arsenal.
Daniel Levy stood above all the battles this summer like an emperor. Its unlikely we shall ever see such a one man show in future transfer windows even from Levy himself as he won’t be receiving so much help from the planets again but everyone at Tottenham will be happy with their leader’s efforts as the world record transfer fee has been banked and half a new team are on board.
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