Holland coach Louis van Gaal was keen on the Tottenham job before becoming aware of Manchester United's interest. Marcel van der Kraan, of De Telegraaf, claims that Tottenham spoke to van Gaal about replacing Andres Villas-Boas in January with both parties agreeing to defer talks until closer to the summer.
Van der Kraan told BBC 5Live: "Louis van Gaal would not discuss anything while David Moyes was still there as the manager at Manchester United.
"Van Gaal is a former player's union man in Holland and was chairman of the union. He is a man of principle.
"He was approached two weeks ago by the Glazer family, but told them 'you have that manager, I will not sit down and discuss my future at your club.'
"So a delegation from Manchester United went back and took action and made agreement with David Moyes first and subsequently they flew out to Portugal to meet Van Gaal."
Van der Kraan added: "Louis van Gaal was offered the Tottenham job in the first week of January by Daniel Levy. Mr Levy flew to Holland and met van Gaal in his Dutch penthouse. They discussed for many hours the possibility of taking over immediately.
"Louis van Gaal said 'no sorry I can't do that, never in my club career or national coach career have I done two jobs at the same time. I don't want to be spending my time working between two different employers'.
"Van Gaal agreed [to defer talks with Spurs], then somewhere he was tipped off it would be handy to wait for an even bigger job.
"When he was tipped there could be an even bigger job he did hang on, fruitfully as Manchester United did ask him to have talks."
