***OMT Tottenham v Dinamo Zagreb***

[Daisuk]

The difference is that before the second-half wheels came off against Bayern, we played brilliant football. This match? brick.

Also, though kind of irrelevant, the xg in the Bayern game was something like 2 - 2. The scoreline would suggest they outplayed us, but they scored a hateful of goals from chances you literally don't ever score from. It's not like all of the goals we conceded that game were down to sloppy defending or a poor setup.

 

[Legohamster]

3rd in a 2 horse race that we never ever were top in... I mean that comment is one I’ve never understood. That season several teams were top and blew it but not us
I agree about the cup semis and some odd choices Poch made
The CL final... i would have kept Kane in the bench but it’s easy in hindsight. Poch did what he thought was right and that game died with an appalling referee call.
But with Poch the journey was part of the experience
With Jose the journey is the worst part of the destination looks further away and it’s bumpy and painful

Didnt go top because (shock horror) we brick ourselves away at West Ham and at home to 10 man Arsenal when the league was In our own hands.

 

[Raziel]

In history or in Premiership history? Genuine question.

Premiership history, pressure and money of modern PL differentiates it ..

 

[Spurs7891]

Unbelievable ! Never thought we would threw away the 2-0 first leg lead to lose 0-3 in the second leg and go out of the Europa League ! Feeling bitter about this defeat. Thought we would go on to win the Europa League but instead we didn't even make the quarter finals. Thought we had a good draw when we got Dinamo Zagreb but it seems like on our current form, we can lose to anyone !

Both Mourinho and the players have to take their share of the blame for this defeat. Mourinho picked the wrong team and the players he picked played poorly. It is really stupid of Mourinho to play error-prone Dier-Sanchez in defence and Sissoko-Winks in midfield. It seems like Mourinho underestimated Zagreb and duly got punished.

Annoyingly all the players failed to lift their game as well. Our attack were toothless to get that badly needed goal. Kane and Bale supposed to inspire us but they were out of sorts in this match. Not sure how Kane could miss the golden chance late in extra time. I thought it was a big mistake to replace Lamela with Bale so early in the second half as we conceded the first goal after he was replaced. Our entire defence went to sleep for all their goals.

With the year ending in "1", thought we would win at least 1 trophy this season. And it looked much easier to win the Europa League than the FA Cup or League Cup. But with us out of FA Cup and Europa League, we have to concentrate on winning the League Cup final against Emirates Marketing Project. On our current form, we will need a miracle to beat Emirates Marketing Project now.

 

[scaramanga]

So what happened all of a sudden? After beating CIty and the Scum and tying Chelski and being top of the league everyone was saying how Jose had gotten all the players to pull in the same direction and fight as a team. Even in the first loss to Pool we still played outstanding and were unlucky not to get anything out of that game. And then with the Leicester game it's like the wheels fell off. What exactly happened around mid-December?

Fixture congestion.

 

[scaramanga]

Absolutely.
There was absolutely NO plan.
BTW, why in earth did he start Kane? We should be able to get a goal without Harry Kane starting a game. Instead, we flog him for 122 minutes. He should've been used as a sub.
His subbing tonight was as poor as I have seen from a manager. Clueless. No tactical plan. You take off a wide player who tracks back at a moment in the game where you might be thinking "10 more mins" and replace him with someone who doesn't track properly?
Sorry, this is the side he has bred in terms of their demeanor and confidence. I put Sunday down to an off-day. I put tonight on him.

A side note...this was the first time I looked at Dele and realized he is broken at this club. I think he will rise again, and the k him for trying, but he is broken and not playing well. Winks too. Jose has broken them both. It earmarks Sanchez as a tough motherfudger, and someone I would persevere with myself.

This is the club he inherited in terms of demeanour and confidence. We were like this for 18 months before Mourinho joined.

 

[glasgowspur]

- More like the manager refused players
- Since the 14 months seems controversial, I'll give some laughs. Statistically across almost every measure (GF/GA/Player contributions/shots/away wins) Poch's team was on a decline for at least two seasons (another poster did the homework months before the CL final showing it, and we all gave him brick), half the team had their best records from long before the end.

We had moments and we should remember that but the same guy who everyone seems to support more than Spurs started this spiral, which removes none of the blame from the current manager.

First off I'm in the middle and can both sides of most arguments including the poch and jose debates. You make a lot of good points and I enjoy most of your posts.
I loved poch, he was the right man us, but he failed. I still love him though.
There has been posts about how it all started to go brick, but we seldom see the other side of the argument.
Not only did he join a club that spent less than the traditionally bigger clubs while he was here, they had spent a lot more in the preceding years so had a stronger base.
He managed against those clubs with pep, Klopp and Jose as their managers, all multiple CL and national league titles to their names, and conte at Chelsea.
Then there is Leicester and Everton spending money liberally with various levels of decent managers.
I"d like to include arsenal, but can't.
Looking at that it's hard to think how we not only got top got four multiple times, challenged for the league twice and got to the CL final.
Poch dared us to dream, and we did, or at least I did, his big failure for me was making the dream to big.
I was waiting on Jose to convince me, sadly he hasn't.
But my dreams for Tottenham have returned to where they should be, top six, f a cup or EL win.

 

[thfcsteff]

This is the club he inherited in terms of demeanour and confidence. We were like this for 18 months before Mourinho joined.

Do you not think Mourinho should be getting more from them?

 

[scaramanga]

Do you not think Mourinho should be getting more from them?

Yes. Not sure if he will or not but I'm willing to see if he does.

 

[Raziel]

First off I'm in the middle and can both sides of most arguments including the poch and jose debates. You make a lot of good points and I enjoy most of your posts.
I loved poch, he was the right man us, but he failed. I still love him though.
There has been posts about how it all started to go brick, but we seldom see the other side of the argument.
Not only did he join a club that spent less than the traditionally bigger clubs while he was here, they had spent a lot more in the preceding years so had a stronger base.
He managed against those clubs with pep, Klopp and Jose as their managers, all multiple CL and national league titles to their names, and conte at Chelsea.
Then there is Leicester and Everton spending money liberally with various levels of decent managers.
I"d like to include arsenal, but can't.
Looking at that it's hard to think how we not only got top got four multiple times, challenged for the league twice and got to the CL final.
Poch dared us to dream, and we did, or at least I did, his big failure for me was making the dream to big.
I was waiting on Jose to convince me, sadly he hasn't.
But my dreams for Tottenham have returned to where they should be, top six, f a cup or EL win.

Every manager we hire is playing a rigged game, part of that is our fault (Sugar era and start of PL era with us not in a position to take advantage of new money cost us over a decade of progress), part of that is FA/UK allowing fudging money doping clubs (City/Chelsea), and they all have had to do more with less.

Poch is a culmination of the club addressing a lot of that handicap over 15+ years prior, we have now been in Europe for 12 or so consecutive years (end here most likely), Harry got 4th twice in three years, AVB as someone mentioned put up a points total that in almost every other year would have been 4th or better, Poch made that consistent, and to his credit made it enjoyable (Harry was almost as divisive as Jose, and a lot of people didn't take to AVB). So as I said, lots of credit to Poch and I would have the view a lot of people have of him if he had walked away post CL (when he knew he was broken, team was broken, reset was needed), but I will never have the view that somehow we were a bottom half team or something with brick players that he magically transformed, and there is no way out of saying a team with Lloris, Jan & Toby, Walker, Rose, Dembele, Eriksen, Kane, Son, Dele (all in the best season/prime of their careers) won nothing ..

We have been setback but not done, once the stadium revenue kicks back in, some normality returns, we will be well positioned to challenge top 4 again regardless of manager/personnel changes

 

[glasgowspur]

Every manager we hire is playing a rigged game, part of that is our fault (Sugar era and start of PL era with us not in a position to take advantage of new money cost us over a decade of progress), part of that is FA/UK allowing fudging money doping clubs (City/Chelsea), and they all have had to do more with less.

Poch is a culmination of the club addressing a lot of that handicap over 15+ years prior, we have now been in Europe for 12 or so consecutive years (end here most likely), Harry got 4th twice in three years, AVB as someone mentioned put up a points total that in almost every other year would have been 4th or better, Poch made that consistent, and to his credit made it enjoyable (Harry was almost as divisive as Jose, and a lot of people didn't take to AVB). So as I said, lots of credit to Poch and I would have the view a lot of people have of him if he had walked away post CL (when he knew he was broken, team was broken, reset was needed), but I will never have the view that somehow we were a bottom half team or something with brick players that he magically transformed, and there is no way out of saying a team with Lloris, Jan & Toby, Walker, Rose, Dembele, Eriksen, Kane, Son, Dele (all in the best season/prime of their careers) won nothing ..

We have been setback but not done, once the stadium revenue kicks back in, some normality returns, we will be well positioned to challenge top 4 again regardless of manager/personnel changes

My only issue is challenge for top four, that is our level, to challenge for top four.
That should be our expectations, but they have been raised to what I see is unrealistic levels.

 

[Raziel]

My only issue is challenge for top four, that is our level, to challenge for top four.
That should be our expectations, but they have been raised to what I see is unrealistic levels.

I'd say most years we should be top 4, there will be years our competition simply put in stupid numbers and we don't get there, but most years 2-3 of top 6 tend to have off/mediocre years and we need to take advantage of that.

And I mentioned it before, in the Levy era we have reach the QFs or better of a cup 21 fudging times, that conversion rate needs to change.

 

[braineclipse]

I'd say most years we should be top 4, there will be years our competition simply put in stupid numbers and we don't get there, but most years 2-3 of top 6 tend to have off/mediocre years and we need to take advantage of that.

And I mentioned it before, in the Levy era we have reach the QFs or better of a cup 21 fudging times, that conversion rate needs to change.

If 2 out of 6 have mediocre years every year that's 33% mediocre years. If 3 out of 6 that's obviously 50%.

Ignoring the chance of teams with less money than us having awesome years, though that happens. What's different with us so that we shouldn't have mediocre years 33-50% of the time?

 

[Raziel]

If 2 out of 6 have mediocre years every year that's 33% mediocre years. If 3 out of 6 that's obviously 50%.

Ignoring the chance of teams with less money than us having awesome years, though that happens. What's different with us so that we shouldn't have mediocre years 33-50% of the time?

By being run better

- Spurs in general is run much better than pretty much every club in the league (despite the constant narrative against Levy/ENIC)
- in 20 years we have used that to buy smart, build infrastructure, market well and improve our position at a better rate than anyone else.

You can go look at average places, income, financial deals, etc 20 years ago vs. now, Spurs has improved at a faster rate (and finished above everyone in league at least once) by being more consistent than anyone (City under Pep is probably the only exception of consistency for obvious reasons).

We are not going to appoint a manager with zero fudging experience, we are not going to buy £70-£100M vanity purchases, we are not going to let bad results continue on and on (Levy is ruthless), our infrastructure investment is beyond the thinking of any other team (City is now thinking about building another "multi-purpose" arena to complement the stadium)

The challenge is we play against cheaters (in more ways than one) and the gap is big, so it becomes the long game in a world where everyone wants instant success.

 

[braineclipse]

By being run better

- Spurs in general is run much better than pretty much every club in the league (despite the constant narrative against Levy/ENIC)
- in 20 years we have used that to buy smart, build infrastructure, market well and improve our position at a better rate than anyone else.

You can go look at average places, income, financial deals, etc 20 years ago vs. now, Spurs has improved at a faster rate (and finished above everyone in league at least once) by being more consistent than anyone (City under Pep is probably the only exception of consistency for obvious reasons).

We are not going to appoint a manager with zero fudging experience, we are not going to buy £70-£100M vanity purchases, we are not going to let bad results continue on and on (Levy is ruthless), our infrastructure investment is beyond the thinking of any other team (City is now thinking about building another "multi-purpose" arena to complement the stadium)

The challenge is we play against cheaters (in more ways than one) and the gap is big, so it becomes the long game in a world where everyone wants instant success.

Then we agree.

 

[Baleforce]

By being run better

- Spurs in general is run much better than pretty much every club in the league (despite the constant narrative against Levy/ENIC)
- in 20 years we have used that to buy smart, build infrastructure, market well and improve our position at a better rate than anyone else.

You can go look at average places, income, financial deals, etc 20 years ago vs. now, Spurs has improved at a faster rate (and finished above everyone in league at least once) by being more consistent than anyone (City under Pep is probably the only exception of consistency for obvious reasons).

We are not going to appoint a manager with zero fudging experience, we are not going to buy £70-£100M vanity purchases, we are not going to let bad results continue on and on (Levy is ruthless), our infrastructure investment is beyond the thinking of any other team (City is now thinking about building another "multi-purpose" arena to complement the stadium)

The challenge is we play against cheaters (in more ways than one) and the gap is big, so it becomes the long game in a world where everyone wants instant success.

Levy must be so frustrated, two decades, done 99% of things right, yet here we are.

 

[Bishop]

By being run better

- Spurs in general is run much better than pretty much every club in the league (despite the constant narrative against Levy/ENIC)
- in 20 years we have used that to buy smart, build infrastructure, market well and improve our position at a better rate than anyone else.

You can go look at average places, income, financial deals, etc 20 years ago vs. now, Spurs has improved at a faster rate (and finished above everyone in league at least once) by being more consistent than anyone (City under Pep is probably the only exception of consistency for obvious reasons).

We are not going to appoint a manager with zero fudging experience, we are not going to buy £70-£100M vanity purchases, we are not going to let bad results continue on and on (Levy is ruthless), our infrastructure investment is beyond the thinking of any other team (City is now thinking about building another "multi-purpose" arena to complement the stadium)

The challenge is we play against cheaters (in more ways than one) and the gap is big, so it becomes the long game in a world where everyone wants instant success.

What exactly do you determine as being "better run"?

 

[Finney Is Back]

Pick the thread mate, we got to a CL final but the team had been stumbling long before that date. Surely you remember the poster who predicted Poch's end? posted a whole long thread, showed GF/GA/points/Player records, early in the year before the CL run.

Just think.... being able to stumble into CL qualifications?.... A mere dream now!

 

[Finney Is Back]

I'd like to add

12) It is tough to see what the next step is.
13) Levy has, in the past and more often than not, hired managers who haven't done the job. And he has also hired ones who have.

The good news is that we tend to go in cycles of having a good one followed by a bad one.....

Santini - bad
Jol - good
Ramos - bad (though did get us the League Cup).
Redknapp - good.
AVB - bad
Sherwood - not sure we can count 6 months really?
Poch - good
Mourinho - bad.

The good done by each of the 'good' managers also has got progressively better so maybe the next manager after Poch will do even better than Pochettino's miracles?

Maybe Mourinho will also mimic Ramos and be a bad manager that nabs the league Cup? Looks unlikely at the moment with our appalling performances but I suppose we have a puncher's chance!

 

[Finney Is Back]

This is the club he inherited in terms of demeanour and confidence. We were like this for 18 months before Mourinho joined.

Since the summer that we finished 3rd and the chairman didn't spend a penny on playing staff improvements.... interesting!