Harry Redknapp had no motive to dodge paying taxes

In the concluding speech for the Tottenham manager's defence, John Kelsey-Fry said the prosecution had no answers as to why such a wealthy individual would try to avoid taxes worth a maximum £70,000.Mr Kelsey-Fry described Redknapp as "an uncommonly kind and generous man", highlighting how he had waived a £140,000 compensation pay-off from Portsmouth and urged the club to plough the money into the youth set-up.As Redknapp's trial for tax evasion entered its third week, the court heard that Redknapp earned "in the region of £1.5 million" as a result of bonus payments and a salary hike for steering Portsmouth to a 13th place finish in the 2003-04 Premier League season."What these figures indicate is that what the prosecution suggest just doesn't make sense," Mr Kelsey-Fry said.Redknapp and Milan Mandaric, his co-accused, claim the two payments into the 'Rosie47' account —$145,000 (about £92,000) in May 2002 and a further payment of $150,000 in May 2004 — were to develop an investment portfolio and were unrelated to the manager’s job at Portsmouth. They both deny two counts of cheating the public revenue.The prosecution have focused on the repeated admissions from Redknapp to Rob Beasley, a reporter then working for the News of the World, that $145,000 paid into his Monaco bank account was “a bonus” and part of his cut on the profit for selling Peter Crouch.Mr Kelsey-Fry told the 12-person jury that they would not be at court had Redknapp not volunteered to investigators the existence of the Monaco account, which he claimed was proof of his client's innocence."It is an inescapable fact that had Mr Redknapp not volunteered his secret it would have remained secret to this day," said the QC. "A guilty Mr Mandaric and a guilty Mr Redknapp would have kept it a secret."The prosecution have absolutely no answer to this. This answer [about the Monaco account] could not have come from the lips of a guilty man. Nobody would ever have known unless they had told them."The Tottenham manager had repeatedly denied the charge over two days of evidence on Wednesday and Thursday, maintaining that he had no motive to evade tax. The jurors will hearing the closing statement from the defence and the closing speech of Judge Anthony Leonard before retiring to consider their verdict on Tuesday.Amid that, Redknapp is expected to take a private jet after the court session on Monday evening to take charge of Spurs in the Barclays Premier League game away to Liverpool.