Daniel Levy - Chairman

[Surfless]

In modern football you need everything to align for sustained success.
The owner, dof, scouts, coach, squad and financials all have to be in place and working off the same page.
We have never had that, we've been close and I'd say this is the closest we come so far.

half a season into the Rev-Angelution I think its a bit early to suggest this is the closest we've come. Poch took us to a Champions League final, with a lot of context against us achieving that - without question that is the crowning achievement of the last 15 years since the league cup win - along with coming second in the league in 16/17.

I love how many people like me are completely sold on the Ange project, but a little bit like a player isn't signed until its on the official site, so success is not expected, its desired and prayed for by all concerned with the club.

 

[harr1984]

half a season into the Rev-Angelution I think its a bit early to suggest this is the closest we've come. Poch took us to a Champions League final, with a lot of context against us achieving that - without question that is the crowning achievement of the last 15 years since the league cup win - along with coming second in the league in 16/17.

I love how many people like me are completely sold on the Ange project, but a little bit like a player isn't signed until its on the official site, so success is not expected, its desired and prayed for by all concerned with the club.

No I'm with @glasgowspur here. Sure, we had a fantastic team under Poch but our infrastructure wasn't anywhere what it is now. Financially we have more spending power than ever, whilst at the same time rivals are restricted due to FFP. Scouting wise we have never been better, when we used to recruit relative unknowns we never knew what we was going to get - real hit and miss signings. Since Paratici we have a consistent track record.

And of course, the team and manager itself has ridiculous potential. We have a team full of young hungry talent along with a couple of wiser heads. We might not ever achieve the promised land, but IMO we have never been more geared for a real crack at it than we are right now....

 

[Surfless]

No I'm with @glasgowspur here. Sure, we had a fantastic team under Poch but our infrastructure wasn't anywhere what it is now. Financially we have more spending power than ever, whilst at the same time rivals are restricted due to FFP. Scouting wise we have never been better, when we used to recruit relative unknowns we never knew what we was going to get - real hit and miss signings. Since Paratici we have a consistent track record.

And of course, the team and manager itself has ridiculous potential. We have a team full of young hungry talent along with a couple of wiser heads. We might not ever achieve the promised land, but IMO we have never been more geared for a real crack at it than we are right now....

my heart is 100% with you on that one, and the FFP stuff can only serve hopefully to strengthen the club's position. But its still a bit too early. We had Paratici in place during some of the Conte debacle, so that system is not infallible. I agree we're recruiting well at the moment, but its only a year or so ago we were sending Gollini home with his tail between his legs, while the likes of Danjuma, Gil and Lenglet were/are not exactly stellar, while the scenario with the lack of central defenders on the books seems to have been instantly forgotten when in actual fact we've played four full backs and occasionally a central midfielder in defence this season.

I'm insanely positive, and also completely invested in Ange, I just think we need to walk before we can run. This season has free license to go up and down for me, and I won't be critical of the boss if he is staying true to his approach and philosophy. I've watched too many knee jerk reactions to bad games and seen too much "we're gonna win the league" when we play well. We need to be moderate - not easy for football fans, and allow the boss to build his team.

Ange has never had access to players of the sort we can put in front of him - he's got riches he's never seen at the moment, so the sky is the limit - just maybe not this season...

 

[glasgowspur]

half a season into the Rev-Angelution I think its a bit early to suggest this is the closest we've come. Poch took us to a Champions League final, with a lot of context against us achieving that - without question that is the crowning achievement of the last 15 years since the league cup win - along with coming second in the league in 16/17.

I love how many people like me are completely sold on the Ange project, but a little bit like a player isn't signed until its on the official site, so success is not expected, its desired and prayed for by all concerned with the club.

I feel like I'm one of the last people on here to still appreciate exactly what Poch did for us, so I'm not knocking him and what he did for us. He is still a Spur to me.
Just think what we may have gone on to achieve if we had paratici and the revenue from the stadium when Poch was banging on about a rebuild.
We had levy, Poch and the making of a great squad, paratici and the money was the missing pieces.

I love ange, I love what he is doing for us and the hope and belief he is bringing to the club.
Combine him with Levy, this growing squad, the cash to improve it and paratici to find the players then I can honestly say I think we are in a better position than we been for a long time.

Maybe it makes me a Tart, but I can't see why you can't love our current manager and a past manager.

 

[glasgowspur]

my heart is 100% with you on that one, and the FFP stuff can only serve hopefully to strengthen the club's position. But its still a bit too early. We had Paratici in place during some of the Conte debacle, so that system is not infallible. I agree we're recruiting well at the moment, but its only a year or so ago we were sending Gollini home with his tail between his legs, while the likes of Danjuma, Gil and Lenglet were/are not exactly stellar, while the scenario with the lack of central defenders on the books seems to have been instantly forgotten when in actual fact we've played four full backs and occasionally a central midfielder in defence this season.

I'm insanely positive, and also completely invested in Ange, I just think we need to walk before we can run. This season has free license to go up and down for me, and I won't be critical of the boss if he is staying true to his approach and philosophy. I've watched too many knee jerk reactions to bad games and seen too much "we're gonna win the league" when we play well. We need to be moderate - not easy for football fans, and allow the boss to build his team.

Ange has never had access to players of the sort we can put in front of him - he's got riches he's never seen at the moment, so the sky is the limit - just maybe not this season...

Conte was the problem, he didn't fit, he wasn't a missing piece, he was the wrong piece.
I don't blame conte, that's on levy IMHO.
The summer conte blanked us and we ended with nuno I didn't want conte, was relieved when we appointed nuno.
Very quickly it was obvious nuno was not the man, then I wanted conte.
Conte was the right wrong manager, when it blew it was going to be a going force levy to face up to the fact that managers like Jose and conte were not good for us.
We need a manager that is going understand our position and buy into it.
Timing killed Poch, maybe, just maybe timing will make ange.

 

[Bishop]

...and if you look at the timeline (and what was going on at the time) Levy couldn't afford those reinforcements at the time.

So something has to give...and it will be the coach that suffers. I understand Pochs side and equally understand DLs side.

There was nothing bricky or horrible going on it was circumstance.

I get the angle but I don't quite agree. Looking at it this way suggests there was nothing we could do, that we were just victims of circumstance.

We could have taken a different approach. We could have, actually should have sold some players at the height of their reputations and reinvested that money into players. 60m for Eriksen in say 2017 gets you Maddison for 20m with change left over to invest in other parts of the squad without unduly damaging the bottom line. Possibly even leaves the club with more money than they had at the time.

I've always wanted a bold and innovative football chairman and sadly under ENIC we haven't been that. Today in 2024 it does feel like we are finally embracing the model that suits the club but it remains to be seen if we can make the bold decisions when necessary.

 

[billyiddo]

I get the angle but I don't quite agree. Looking at it this way suggests there was nothing we could do, that we were just victims of circumstance.

We could have taken a different approach. We could have, actually should have sold some players at the height of their reputations and reinvested that money into players. 60m for Eriksen in say 2017 gets you Maddison for 20m with change left over to invest in other parts of the squad without unduly damaging the bottom line. Possibly even leaves the club with more money than they had at the time.

I've always wanted a bold and innovative football chairman and sadly under ENIC we haven't been that. Today in 2024 it does feel like we are finally embracing the model that suits the club but it remains to be seen if we can make the bold decisions when necessary.

There's always something different that could have been done to improve on what you achieved - however to have done much better than we did over that period would have required a near faultless approach (and return on that approach) from all angles of the club imv

 

[Glenda's Legs]

half a season into the Rev-Angelution I think its a bit early to suggest this is the closest we've come. Poch took us to a Champions League final, with a lot of context against us achieving that - without question that is the crowning achievement of the last 15 years since the league cup win - along with coming second in the league in 16/17.

I love how many people like me are completely sold on the Ange project, but a little bit like a player isn't signed until its on the official site, so success is not expected, its desired and prayed for by all concerned with the club.

I think we are all just a bit (very) giddy at the moment. It's been a hard few years since the good Poch days. We are now once more enjoying watching how we play football; Ange is like a breath of fresh air; we are even being reasonable in that yeah, an FA Cup could be good but hey it's a rebuild, we can wait a bit longer. But at the same time there's that voice saying 'but why not, we can do it this year.'
So yes I agree, we are not level yet with Poch's best and we need to wait to see what happens with Ange. But Poch's 'best' crept up on us almost unexpectedly. Now it truly feels that we are on the cusp of something special, but while we're not quite there, we feel that it will happen. I mean before this season could you imagine a scenario where we concede a third goal at home to Chelsea, and to man (and woman) the crowd stand and applaud our players? That to me shows we have something exceptional going on and that leads to expectation, but what I would term a 'tempered' expectation.
That's a whole lot of burble for Levy had got us to a place where we now have expectations for the right reasons - because we can see what we are building and how we are playing - rather than an expectation based a on days of yore and a sense of entitlement.

 

[Bullet]

I've waited decades for this moment.
Cheatski and Leeds cheated and kept us out of the top of the table, depriving us. Leeds got their dues, but Cheatski kept on cheating. Then City started cheating.
We've all waited and waited and waited for FFP to bite, for Spurs to have the new stadium up and running, for the right manager and a decent team, for the right recruitment team (Paratici, Lange et al) and maybe, just maybe we are getting close to the day when it all comes together.

 

[Bishop]

There's always something different that could have been done to improve on what you achieved - however to have done much better than we did over that period would have required a near faultless approach (and return on that approach) from all angles of the club imv

Maybe, but we should have at least tried. Just holding on to our existing players and bringing nobody in was never going to work imo.

 

[K.D.D.D.D.Soc]

Of course Levy wants to win things and has said as much. Do you really think he has to announce it regularly for some reason?

Unfortunately yes there are so many people who feel we should have followed the overspend which many clubs did. Whatever previous managers who all failed to win a trophy say I'm sure Levy would have loved to have won silverware even just to stuff it up the moaners collective arses. His job is to move the club forward and being a regular competitor in CL will do than more effectively than winning either cup however thrilling it might be, I'm sure Wigan and Portsmouth would swap there cup wins for regular places in PL and CL.

 

[billyiddo]

Maybe, but we should have at least tried. Just holding on to our existing players and bringing nobody in was never going to work imo.

Well tbf we sold Walker rather than try and hold on and then tried to move on from Alderweireld but got the buy wrong - we could have tried to have sold other players too but it would have required their replacements working out, which of course isn't guaranteed.

We also spent a considerable chunk on Sissoko trying to improve on the CM options but again got that wrong - so i don't think it's true to say we made no attempt to improve the team at various points - it's just we never could

 

[Bishop]

Well tbf we sold Walker rather than try and hold on and then tried to move on from Alderweireld but got the buy wrong - we could have tried to have sold other players too but it would have required their replacements working out, which of course isn't guaranteed.

We also spent a considerable chunk on Sissoko trying to improve on the CM options but again got that wrong - so i don't think it's true to say we made no attempt to improve the team at various points - it's just we never could

Jesus Christ Sissoko and the words improve midfield options!

Sorry you just brought up some very bad feelings in me.

 

[Surfless]

Conte was the problem, he didn't fit, he wasn't a missing piece, he was the wrong piece.
I don't blame conte, that's on levy IMHO.
The summer conte blanked us and we ended with nuno I didn't want conte, was relieved when we appointed nuno.
Very quickly it was obvious nuno was not the man, then I wanted conte.
Conte was the right wrong manager, when it blew it was going to be a going force levy to face up to the fact that managers like Jose and conte were not good for us.
We need a manager that is going understand our position and buy into it.
Timing killed Poch, maybe, just maybe timing will make ange.

I agree with every word of that - the first 4 lines I could have written myself - literally exactly what I felt at the time.

 

[Surfless]

I get the angle but I don't quite agree. Looking at it this way suggests there was nothing we could do, that we were just victims of circumstance.

We could have taken a different approach. We could have, actually should have sold some players at the height of their reputations and reinvested that money into players. 60m for Eriksen in say 2017 gets you Maddison for 20m with change left over to invest in other parts of the squad without unduly damaging the bottom line. Possibly even leaves the club with more money than they had at the time.

I've always wanted a bold and innovative football chairman and sadly under ENIC we haven't been that. Today in 2024 it does feel like we are finally embracing the model that suits the club but it remains to be seen if we can make the bold decisions when necessary.

given the exceptional stadium we have and the personal investment he put into it, I would argue we have got a bold and innovative football chairman, just not necessarily on the football side!

 

[Raziel]

I get the angle but I don't quite agree. Looking at it this way suggests there was nothing we could do, that we were just victims of circumstance.

We could have taken a different approach. We could have, actually should have sold some players at the height of their reputations and reinvested that money into players. 60m for Eriksen in say 2017 gets you Maddison for 20m with change left over to invest in other parts of the squad without unduly damaging the bottom line. Possibly even leaves the club with more money than they had at the time.

I've always wanted a bold and innovative football chairman and sadly under ENIC we haven't been that. Today in 2024 it does feel like we are finally embracing the model that suits the club but it remains to be seen if we can make the bold decisions when necessary.

I disagree with your wording (seems similar to @Surfless )

- Levy is bold and innovative, from early DoF, to training facility , to stadium, etc.
- He also has the balls to actually make a decision, agree/disagree with his choices, when Levy thinks something is no longer working, he fudging changes it (Poch, Jose, Nuno, Conte, recruitment teams), compared to United watching ETH drift towards the rocks (after 3 years of nonsense under OGS) shows the opposite view.

What he hasn't been is a risk taker, those moments where "perhaps" a little financial risk would have paid off with on field results.

But what I would say to that is hindsight creates bias, buying a player doesn't guarantee success and I think the last Poch window is a perfect example of that -> Sess, Ndombele, Lo Celso & Clarke, does anyone really think giving Poch those players (they are all his choices) a year early makes any difference to that particular outcome?

 

[glasgowspur]

I disagree with your wording (seems similar to @Surfless )

- Levy is bold and innovative, from early DoF, to training facility , to stadium, etc.
- He also has the balls to actually make a decision, agree/disagree with his choices, when Levy thinks something is no longer working, he fudging changes it (Poch, Jose, Nuno, Conte, recruitment teams), compared to United watching ETH drift towards the rocks (after 3 years of nonsense under OGS) shows the opposite view.

What he hasn't been is a risk taker, those moments where "perhaps" a little financial risk would have paid off with on field results.

But what I would say to that is hindsight creates bias, buying a player doesn't guarantee success and I think the last Poch window is a perfect example of that -> Sess, Ndombele, Lo Celso & Clarke, does anyone really think giving Poch those players (they are all his choices) a year early makes any difference to that particular outcome?

I don't think Clarke was a Poch signing, minor point.
Poch was done by then, you could have given him anyone, may have prolonged it but ultimately the end was in sight.
At some point the Levy and Poch diverged in the way forward, a partnership that had been working well together splintered.
Levy had built up a shell against the critics about the lack of a trophy, he could play the long.
Poch didn't have that, he couldn't see the longer game, understandable as coach his reputation is built on winning.

 

[Bishop]

I disagree with your wording (seems similar to @Surfless )

- Levy is bold and innovative, from early DoF, to training facility , to stadium, etc.
- He also has the balls to actually make a decision, agree/disagree with his choices, when Levy thinks something is no longer working, he fudging changes it (Poch, Jose, Nuno, Conte, recruitment teams), compared to United watching ETH drift towards the rocks (after 3 years of nonsense under OGS) shows the opposite view.

What he hasn't been is a risk taker, those moments where "perhaps" a little financial risk would have paid off with on field results.

But what I would say to that is hindsight creates bias, buying a player doesn't guarantee success and I think the last Poch window is a perfect example of that -> Sess, Ndombele, Lo Celso & Clarke, does anyone really think giving Poch those players (they are all his choices) a year early makes any difference to that particular outcome?

It's not hindsight when I've always been consistent on these matters and I've never asked for more spending, I've demanded better spending. Working smarter in the market, we've largely been snail like and quite stupid imo too often. Sometimes you need to use the market to your advantage, sometimes that's selling at a peak, sometimes that's buying ahead of schedule and we haven't done that enough or well enough.

And yes I do think giving Poch those players a season earlier would have made a difference. By the time Ndombele and Lo Celso came in the midfield was utterly stale and he was having to make a raft changes to the midfield composition and playstyle all at the same time and was given 12 games to do so. That's not good enough imo. We needed fresh blood in midfielder a season or two before when Wanyama was falling apart, when Demebele could no longer run. We actually went into seasons with Winks and Sissoko as our choice starting pair, that's fudging ridiculous and gross negligence from everyone in the management team through to the chairman imo.

I'm not even a Poch diehard, I appreciated the work he did here but I'm not a sycophant. A lot of that good work was down to the foundations that he was given but he also failed for the exact same reasons, the foundations that he was given.

 

[Bedfordspurs]

It's not hindsight when I've always been consistent on these matters and I've never asked for more spending, I've demanded better spending. Working smarter in the market, we've largely been snail like and quite stupid imo too often. Sometimes you need to use the market to your advantage, sometimes that's selling at a peak, sometimes that's buying ahead of schedule and we haven't done that enough or well enough.

And yes I do think giving Poch those players a season earlier would have made a difference. By the time Ndombele and Lo Celso came in the midfield was utterly stale and he was having to make a raft changes to the midfield composition and playstyle all at the same time and was given 12 games to do so. That's not good enough imo. We needed fresh blood in midfielder a season or two before when Wanyama was falling apart, when Demebele could no longer run. We actually went into seasons with Winks and Sissoko as our choice starting pair, that's fudging ridiculous and gross negligence from everyone in the management team through to the chairman imo.

I'm not even a Poch diehard, I appreciated the work he did here but I'm not a sycophant. A lot of that good work was down to the foundations that he was given but he also failed for the exact same reasons, the foundations that he was given.

Poch declined some easy wins
He turned down signings that may have given him and the squad a refresh
He never changed his coaches so it was the same voices
They were his choices
That also (IMO) comes with his lack of experience
I can see it Arsenal now with Lego head. He is hitting brick walls and doesn’t have answers

 

[braineclipse]

It's not hindsight when I've always been consistent on these matters and I've never asked for more spending, I've demanded better spending. Working smarter in the market, we've largely been snail like and quite stupid imo too often. Sometimes you need to use the market to your advantage, sometimes that's selling at a peak, sometimes that's buying ahead of schedule and we haven't done that enough or well enough.

And yes I do think giving Poch those players a season earlier would have made a difference. By the time Ndombele and Lo Celso came in the midfield was utterly stale and he was having to make a raft changes to the midfield composition and playstyle all at the same time and was given 12 games to do so. That's not good enough imo. We needed fresh blood in midfielder a season or two before when Wanyama was falling apart, when Demebele could no longer run. We actually went into seasons with Winks and Sissoko as our choice starting pair, that's fudging ridiculous and gross negligence from everyone in the management team through to the chairman imo.

I'm not even a Poch diehard, I appreciated the work he did here but I'm not a sycophant. A lot of that good work was down to the foundations that he was given but he also failed for the exact same reasons, the foundations that he was given.

We've seen periods of better and worse spending under Levy. Imo depending on who's been in charge of transfers (usually a group rather than an individual).

Of course who Levy has put in place to do that job is on him. And he's had his misses and trusted the wrong people at the wrong time. That's on him, but at the same time that's also fairly common. Pretty much unheard of to have consistency over decades in that regard as a club with the people in charge changing.

Like you I'm not a Poch sycophant. He did probably fail in part due to the foundations he had to work within. And because of the limitations in transfer funds during the stadium build period. But he also failed because of him making poor decisions. Like everyone else, like Levy.