David Ginola last night signed for Aston Villa in a £3 million sterling move from Tottenham with a broadside at the north-London club which the Frenchman claims he never wanted to leave.

The French winger announced the completion of his protracted move to the Midlands on his personal website after several hours of negotiations, first with Villa's manager John Gregory and then with the chairman Doug Ellis in a Birmingham hotel yesterday.

He has signed a two-year contract worth around £30,000 a week.

Gregory had claimed: "Give me a face-to-face meeting with Ginola and he wouldn't leave without signing."

Yesterday Villa's manager received that chance and it is believed he immediately challenged the 33-year-old player to prove that he could still flourish in the Premiership rather than take the soft option of playing out his career in a less demanding league abroad.

It appears Gregory's gauntlet won the day, which has been a long time coming since the middle of last month, when Ginola first learned that Tottenham had accepted a £3 million offer from Villa. To the Frenchman, it was "bombshell news".

"It totally ruined my summer," said Ginola on his website. "I never asked to leave, I was happy at White Hart Lane and my family were settled in north London.

"But it was quite clear that Spurs - and I am not quite clear whether Alan Sugar or George Graham - didn't want me around any more and so were prepared to let me leave.

"Once I got over the shock I was very disappointed to learn that the club had put a £3 million price-tag on my head.

"I am 33 and, although I feel I have still got at least two years left in me playing at the highest level, I felt I should have been rewarded for my time at Spurs with a free transfer. That would have given me far more freedom in choosing which club to join.

"In fact, Spurs originally quoted Villa £4 million, but then accepted a bid of £3 million. People then said I was being greedy with my demands, but I hope they understand that, if I was being pushed out of Spurs - and I fought long and hard to avoid that - then I was going to leave on my terms.

"All I did was to try and get a decent wage, again wildly exaggerated in the press, for having to leave Tottenham and uprooting to the Midlands.

"People have to appreciate that I did not anticipate any of this, having signed a three-year contract with Tottenham only 12 months ago."

There was little indication earlier over the weekend that the 1999 double player-of-the-year would move to Villa, but the deadline issued by Gregory and Graham's decision to leave him out of Saturday's friendly at Birmingham City helped persuade Ginola to sever his ties.

The division at White Hart Lane between Graham and Ginola was clear last season as the manager substituted the Frenchman repeatedly and finally warned him that he could not expect an automatic place in the upcoming campaign.

Dan Petrescu also fired a parting shot at his former manager Gianluca Vialli after completing a whirlwind £1 million move to Bradford City.

The 32-year-old Romanian wing back signed a four-year deal barely 24 hours after his first contact with the Yorkshire club and admitted that his differences with Chelsea's manager had hastened his exit.

Petrescu fell out of favour with Vialli halfway through last season and it became inevitable they would part.

"I knew that from the manager," said the versatile Petrescu, who was also the subject of a late offer from Middlesbrough just before signing for Bradford at 11.15 p.m. on Saturday.

But he added: "I was very happy there and the club treated me fantastically the chairman (Ken Bates) and (managing director) Colin Hutchinson, but unfortunately they don't pick the team. He (Vialli) has his ideas about football and I have my ideas.

"I just wanted to play and to keep my place in the national team and, when I had the chance of coming to Bradford City and met the chairman and the manager, I knew it was right from the start. We just met, I think, for half an hour and the deal was done."

Richmond said: "This probably is the quickest transfer in the history of transfers."