K ENWYNE Jones looks back with little more than a shrug of the shoulders to the time when he so nearly became a Spurs player.

The 27-year-old striker was leading the front line at Sunderland when he was courted in vain by Harry Redknapp throughout the first six months of 2009.

Spurs had an £18m bid rejected, then offered Darren Bent as a makeweight in a part-exchange deal as they desperately tried to get their hands on the Trinidad and Tobago captain.

Ricky Sbragia, the then Black Cats manager, held firm, insisting it would take "£50m or something like that" to prise away his star man.

In the end, Steve Bruce replaced Sbragia, Jones linked up, prolifically at first, with Bent – then exited after all, but to the Potteries, for £8m midway through 2010.

"I knew about the offer," a rather coy Jones admitted this week. "It was a funny situation and my family and friends know what happened.

"A lot of things happen in football, that move didn't.

"But I'm always happy, and I have to thank God for my life and for my family. I love my job and I consider myself very lucky."

Jones has largely been restricted to Europa League duties for Stoke this season, making only three Premier League starts and none since Peter Crouch arrived for £10m in August.

He is likely to be restricted to a place on the bench again when Spurs roll into town defending their historic status as the Potters' biggest bogey team.

Of all the top-flight clubs, it is against Tottenham that Stoke hold the worst record, mainly due to having won just twice in 36 league visits to White Hart Lane.

The fixture has proved a little more competitive since City won promotion to the Premier League in 2008, with Stoke getting the better in two of six encounters, as well as edging a League Cup battle on penalties in September.

Jones said: "You have to admire their team, they play great football and they're doing very well at the moment.

"But as much as we respect their talents we have to show our own to shout about too.

"Records count for nothing, it will be how we perform on the day that matters. We know we will need to be at our best but we are confident."

Jones insisted that confidence never took a battering during Stoke's torrid autumn, suffering five defeats in six games from mid-October to late-November.

"We work hard and we never lost faith in ourselves," he said.

"Of course everyone was happy after winning at Everton but we don't go into training celebrating.

"We have been working just as hard this week getting ready for the next match."