James told to 'knuckle down'

James came close to a move to Tottenham (GETTY IMAGES)

The Portsmouth chief executive, Peter Storrie, has challenged David James to "knuckle down and work hard" after a bid for the England goalkeeper failed to materialise on transfer deadline day.

James was linked with a move to Tottenham, however, with no offer forthcoming he has little choice but to get on with the job for Paul Hart's squad which also includes young keeper Asmir Begovic, veteran Antti Niemi and Jamie Ashdown.

"David has got to knuckle down and work hard," Storrie said. "He may be the England goalkeeper, but we have got a lot of talented goalkeepers here. David has got competition, believe me.

"As far as we are concerned, he is under contract and here to give 100 per cent to Portsmouth Football Club. If he does not want that he has to tell us that. We didn't actually get any offers for him," Storrie added. "There was interest from Spurs as I understand it, but we had no direct offer. They wanted to trade Carlo Cudicini, but that wasn't anything which interested us."