Spurs keeper Heurelho Gomes has revealed he owes his career not to the opportunity granted him by current boss Juande Ramos, but to his manager's opposite number this weekend, Chelsea's Luis Felipe Scolari.

Ramos took a gamble on Gomes this summer when he splashed out £7.8million on the Brazilian from PSV, but it was Scolari who took the biggest risk by promoting him from a school team reserve player, to the playing staff at professional side Cruzeiro.

"I was only the reserve 'keeper for the junior side," the 27-year-old recalled in the Hotspur Magazine, who will come face to face with his former mentor this weekend when his new side travel to Stamford Bridge this Sunday.

"But then one day I was asked by Mr Scolari to join the first-team for training.

"It was amazing. I had leapfrogged the main junior 'keeper and here I was, training with Brazil international goalkeeper Dida, who was someone I looked up to and still do.

"Just to be involved gave me masses of confidence and I learned so much from Dida and Scolari in those early days."

Gomes has had a tough ride to get to where he is today, after being brought up in a poverty-stricken village in south-east Brazil, where he lived without electricity.

"You might read about my background, my mannerisms, and you might think I'm a little eccentric, but you'd be wrong," said Gomes.

"I'm a guy who likes to be happy and I come to work with a smile on my face. I appreciate what I've got now because it hasn't always been that way for me.

"My family had very little money, we had no electricity - and the only time I saw a TV was if I went to the home of one of my friends. It was a very sheltered upbringing."

[Guardian-Series]

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