Last season, Tottenham Hotspur FC were the picture boys for a club in serious transition.
Having sold former talisman Gareth Bale for the same amount Montenegro had taken in credits from commercial banks to cover their 2013 budget deficit, then new-manager André Villas Boas had decided to splash every penny of the monolithic £85 million inlay and more, signing solid talent from seven different countries within seven weeks in probable hopes of compensating for the absence of Bale’s menace. In retrospect, I don’t blame him – if their star player had been justifiably lured away by a club the stature of Real Madrid, that’s what any fan would do… on FIFA ’14. Did I mention that’s what a fan would do? And this was reality. You know, the realm in which it takes actual minutes, hours, days of hard work under proper management for players to gel together. Boas didn’t seem too worried, but if he seemed out of it, Daniel Levy by contrast looked bat sh*t insane when he fired the Spaniard by October 6, on the back of two wins and a draw – and a draw against Chelsea at that! – which had Spurs in second place. If you’re trying to make sense of that, don’t bother.
Then came Boas’ replacement to end that season: Tim Sherwood. The man who said, and I quote, “I am an Arsenal fan”, “My dad still goes to the Emirates every week”, “I would love to see them do well”. The man who wept as he admitted his side’s nullified chances of a top four finish after losing to Chelsea. The man who invited a fan to take his place in the White Hart Lane dugout at his last game for the club. And yet, despite it all, Sherwood went on to win 50% of the Lily Whites’ remaining games – more than any Spurs manager in history. No, don’t make sense of that either.
After all this drama, what finally made sense was the appointment of Mauricio Pochettino to the fore on May 27 this year. Having been responsible for Southampton’s meteoric rise to third in the first half of last season, in Pochettino Spurs had a manager who embodied exactly what the club seemed to have lost last season – high pressing tactics, intimidation through pressure building, an overall supremely attacking style of football, and a brown haired manager under the age of 40 whose default expression was that of settled confusion. Alright, perhaps that last criterion is solely Daniel Levy’s, but in seriousness the buried heads of the White Hart Lane faithful finally had a reason to surface. This change in managerial mindset, coupled with the fact that all that foreign talent had already undergone a year of gelling, bode well. And it all seemed to fall together at least in the first few weeks – Spurs smashed five goals past West Ham and QPR in their first two games before losing to Liverpool, and then narrowly missed out on two points against Sunderland due to an unfortunate 82nd minute own goal by Harry Kane that ended the match in a 2 – 2 draw. Had they beaten West Bromwich Albion in the week after, the side would currently be on 17 points from 21, equal with Mourinho’s Chelsea.
Yet as much as this may be something to think about, the fact remains that they didn’t beat Sunderland, and they didn’t beat West Bromwich Albion – it is such slips which, albeit attributable to Pochettino settling into his job, must be avoided if Spurs are to realistically think about finishing in the top four this season. And what better opportunity to stamp their authority and declare their now much more realistic ambitions than in their next game which is away against Manchester City. An assured defensive performance by Stoke City away at the Etihad earned them three points, so why not Spurs, who have one of the best goalkeepers in Hugo Lloris as their captain? It could be argued that the three clubs immediately below Spurs right now are all playing relatively easier opposition, but to be frank, any opposition that isn’t Chelsea or Manchester City this season can be considered as relatively easier.
The big question surrounding the white side of North London hence remains this: can they handle the pressure?
Time will tell.
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