Mauricio Pochettino never wanted Emmanuel Adebayor exit

Mauricio Pochettino never wanted Emmanuel Adebayor to leave and has urged everyone connected with Tottenham to put the past behind them.

A divisive figure at White Hart Lane, the 30-year-old looked set to leave the club before Monday’s transfer deadline, having plumped for a loan move to West Ham.

However, the intervention of chairman Daniel Levy means the highly-paid striker will remain at Spurs for the rest of the season — a decision which pleased Pochettino, despite having been ready to see Adebayor leave.

“I knew he could go and I would have been happy to play with two strikers for the rest of the season,” the Tottenham head coach said.

“Possibly, we could have used Nacer Chadli or Erik Lamela, but the first thing was that I wanted to keep Adebayor in the squad. It is important to clarify that.

“After, when the players want to play more or some club calls them, and they want to leave because they feel they can play more, it becomes a club decision.”

Adebayor has started just one game since early November due to time sidelined through injury, illness and a period of compassionate leave.

However, Pochettino says Adebayor has a “long way” to recovering his fitness and, just as importantly, confidence — something which had hit by his own supporters. Adebayor says the recent booing aimed at him by Tottenham fans made him “very sad” and Pochettino has echoed his calls for everyone to move on.

“It’s important the fans forget the past,” the Argentine said.

“And now, all together, we need to try to get the success because we are in a key moment.”

Tottenham host Arsenal in tomorrow’s North London derby — ahead of which Pochettino expressed his admiration for Arsenal counterpart Arsene Wenger.

“It is difficult for me to imagine the next season, so 18 years — woah,” he said.

“This is why I admire so much Arsene because it’s not easy for a manager to stay in the same place a lot of time like him.”

Meanwhile, Jack Wilshere appeared to hit back at his critics after becoming embroiled in another smoking controversy.

Photos of the midfielder holding a shisha pipe at a nightclub were posted on social media and quickly made national headlines.

Last night, Wilshere posted on Instagram a video of himself in training as he recovers from ankle surgery along with the message: “Worry about your character not your reputation, because your character is who you are and your reputation is only what people who don’t know you think about you!”

The Gunners are to seek clarification from Wilshere over the circumstances of the incident, which is understood to have happened during a night out with friends in central London last week.

The latest revelations around Wilshere will come as an unwelcome distraction to Wenger as he prepares his squad for the trip to White Hart Lane, with the subject now set to dominate the agenda at today’s pre-match conference.

Leading scorer Alexis Sanchez will again be out because of a hamstring injury which saw him miss the 5-0 win over Aston Villa, but England forward Danny Welbeck is in line to make a return after being out since December 28 with a thigh problem.

Wenger said: “Alexis is not ready. He is not far away, the Leicester game is a possibility. He is of course very difficult to keep quiet. He is training, but it’s light training.”

Wenger added Wilshere was set to be “back in full training next week, hopefully from Sunday”.