For the first time in years, Pochettino’s position at Spurs can be questioned, because he set the rules on how to judge him
Read article
Read article
-
The Fighting Cock is a forum for fans of Tottenham Hotspur Football Club. Here you can discuss Spurs latest matches, our squad, tactics and any transfer news surrounding the club. Registration gives you access to all our forums (including 'Off Topic' discussion) and removes most of the adverts (you can remove them all via an account upgrade). You're here now, you might as well...
Latest Spurs videos from Sky Sports
I don't think Poch is managing for his job over the next 7 games as I don't think Levy will rock the boat this summer, but if we fail to make the Champions League over the next two seasons he will be gone.
This summer transfer window is vital. Need to take some actual risks, not the kind where we don't spend any money. And from the sound of it, both Levy and Poch need to be more flexible in their demands in order to shake up the squad a bit.
This summer transfer window is vital. Need to take some actual risks, not the kind where we don't spend any money. And from the sound of it, both Levy and Poch need to be more flexible in their demands in order to shake up the squad a bit.
I don’t think that he should be judged on this season alone but on his overall contribution.
Some of us are disappointed with our recent bad run
One point out of a possible fifteen
But we are in the CL last 8 and favourites to finish in the top four which I’m confident we will
That’ll do me!
Some of us are disappointed with our recent bad run
One point out of a possible fifteen
But we are in the CL last 8 and favourites to finish in the top four which I’m confident we will
That’ll do me!
Excellent piece, everything I've thought about. Poch has lost direction in how we play and started to look abit of a tinker man. When we finished 2nd we could all turn up and know how we would set up and the 11 starting bar any injuries. Certain players don't get a run of games. The backline is constantly changing and we go from a 3 to back four not from game to game but half to half. He needs to ditch the back 3 and diamond shit. Play what he knows 4-2-3-1 and pick Jan and toby week in week out. When a manager constantly tinkers its first sign he is lacking clarity in his thinking. 7 games, best 11, 4-2-3-1
It's a sh!t run strewn with individual mistakes and lacking strength of mind.
I won't call it lack of effort because that would be an insult to the players and an over simplistic means to assessing what's going on and a nonsense.
But the run is a result of many things and a culmination and result of not covering the loss of Dembele and injury prone state of Wanyama and thinking it okay to go a whole season without buying a player.
So, for me it is mostly Pochettino because he has just tinkered too much and seems to not know what kind of player he wants and to some extent Levy, one would presume, in that he has not loosened the purse strings, even for a loan signing or two.
The issue for me is what are fans honestly seeing that will make Pochettino and us so much better next season and beyond?
I won't call it lack of effort because that would be an insult to the players and an over simplistic means to assessing what's going on and a nonsense.
But the run is a result of many things and a culmination and result of not covering the loss of Dembele and injury prone state of Wanyama and thinking it okay to go a whole season without buying a player.
So, for me it is mostly Pochettino because he has just tinkered too much and seems to not know what kind of player he wants and to some extent Levy, one would presume, in that he has not loosened the purse strings, even for a loan signing or two.
The issue for me is what are fans honestly seeing that will make Pochettino and us so much better next season and beyond?
I definitely think it's fair to question Pochettino.
I've had minor issues with him throughout, but I expect that with any manager/coach/player/chairman etc but the general overriding qualities he brings have mostly mitigated any minor issues I've had with him.
I think he's often made poor selection choices at big moments, or made poor tactical choices at big moments or both (early example was playing Townsend and Chadli in the LC final instead of Lamela and Dembele - later things like Son as a LWB in the FAC semi). He's neglected the midfield for much of his tenure IMO. His in game management is often very poor, he's often slow to react. he often sets us up badly for big games. And then there's the whole bullshit "promoter of youth" thing, which grates heavily.
But most of these have been easily superseded by the fact that he's a very good coach with a very clear ethic, invariably improves individuals he works with, and most importantly had the ability to improve us as a collective, with the ball and enormously without it.
He is, or has been, without doubt, the best pure coach in my 50 years.
Issues I've got now are no longer those minor ones though, they are more fundamental.
The minor selection issues have become major ones.
Week after week he picks this structure that just doesn't suit us, doesn't get the best out of the players we have. Makes us less than the sum of our parts, not more or even level. Insanity is repeating the same thing and hoping for a different outcome.
How any top grade manager can think Sissoko belongs in a midfield competing for titles is frankly very, very worrying. Whatever we think of Sissoko, he's does not belong at this level. You have to drop a long way down this league to find midfielders who are technically and intellectually worse, you have to drop a few pegs down to find a more disjointed and incoherent midfield than ours is now. Before the Sissoko issue, there was Dier plodding around, and Poch thinking he was good enough to play there regularly.
And it's thinking that he can play players who don't want the ball under pressure, but persisting with trying to play from the back - under pressure.
How bad do senior players need to be before the great "brave promoter of youth" actually grows some bollocks and promotes youth?
We used to try and dictate games from midfield, now we just bypass it.
Two central strikers, no wide AM/Forwards, meaning the FB's that are already getting blamed for everything, are even more exposed. Moura as one of those central strikers?
And then there's the fundamental issue of what type of team are we now? We don't press high up any more really. There's very little tenacity in our midfield. I can only remember one great 90 minutes of football all season, against Cheslea at home.
Currently, I think his selections, particularly a couple, are absolutely tragic, I think his structural set ups are fucking terrible, and we are not even an aggressive cohesive group without the ball any more.
We are a bunch of decent footballers, quite well coached generally, throwing the dice every week.
I know there have been mitigating issues. The WC killed us. People don't want to admit it's a thing and players would never say it, because it would seem "weak", but there is no way it's not affected us more than most, even the injuries are possibly a sign of this.
And we have had the ground bollocks.
But these things aren't forcing Poch to pick certain players over others. The bullshit "paid to train" mantra has been changed to "if I paid 30m for you you can play no matter how shit you train". Playing at Wembley doesn't force him to choose poor tactics. The WC should have been an opportunity to give young players more game time, not marginalise them.
Even if you disagree with my personal player selection gripes, I'm sure you'll all have your own. Tripper, Rose, Davies, Lloris....whoever.
Now, maybe we'll smash the last 7 games, clear out the dross, sign some decent players and become the good version of a Pochettino team again. I don't even care if we don't make CL, as long as I can get on board with the way we are set up and play. Our cohesion as a team. I put much more stall in performances than I do trophies. As long as we look like a cohesive unit with and without the ball, I'm pretty happy.
And these are not sudden issues because we're on a bad run. I voiced many of them last season, and at the beginning of this season (and the middle) when we were winning games but not playing well. Many of us were getting shit for saying that results won't always outrun performances.
If we get back on track then I'll give him lots of credit, as I have for the great things he's done previously and the massive overall effect for the positive he's had on this club. But right now I'm just calling what I see and feel.
I've had minor issues with him throughout, but I expect that with any manager/coach/player/chairman etc but the general overriding qualities he brings have mostly mitigated any minor issues I've had with him.
I think he's often made poor selection choices at big moments, or made poor tactical choices at big moments or both (early example was playing Townsend and Chadli in the LC final instead of Lamela and Dembele - later things like Son as a LWB in the FAC semi). He's neglected the midfield for much of his tenure IMO. His in game management is often very poor, he's often slow to react. he often sets us up badly for big games. And then there's the whole bullshit "promoter of youth" thing, which grates heavily.
But most of these have been easily superseded by the fact that he's a very good coach with a very clear ethic, invariably improves individuals he works with, and most importantly had the ability to improve us as a collective, with the ball and enormously without it.
He is, or has been, without doubt, the best pure coach in my 50 years.
Issues I've got now are no longer those minor ones though, they are more fundamental.
The minor selection issues have become major ones.
Week after week he picks this structure that just doesn't suit us, doesn't get the best out of the players we have. Makes us less than the sum of our parts, not more or even level. Insanity is repeating the same thing and hoping for a different outcome.
How any top grade manager can think Sissoko belongs in a midfield competing for titles is frankly very, very worrying. Whatever we think of Sissoko, he's does not belong at this level. You have to drop a long way down this league to find midfielders who are technically and intellectually worse, you have to drop a few pegs down to find a more disjointed and incoherent midfield than ours is now. Before the Sissoko issue, there was Dier plodding around, and Poch thinking he was good enough to play there regularly.
And it's thinking that he can play players who don't want the ball under pressure, but persisting with trying to play from the back - under pressure.
How bad do senior players need to be before the great "brave promoter of youth" actually grows some bollocks and promotes youth?
We used to try and dictate games from midfield, now we just bypass it.
Two central strikers, no wide AM/Forwards, meaning the FB's that are already getting blamed for everything, are even more exposed. Moura as one of those central strikers?
And then there's the fundamental issue of what type of team are we now? We don't press high up any more really. There's very little tenacity in our midfield. I can only remember one great 90 minutes of football all season, against Cheslea at home.
Currently, I think his selections, particularly a couple, are absolutely tragic, I think his structural set ups are fucking terrible, and we are not even an aggressive cohesive group without the ball any more.
We are a bunch of decent footballers, quite well coached generally, throwing the dice every week.
I know there have been mitigating issues. The WC killed us. People don't want to admit it's a thing and players would never say it, because it would seem "weak", but there is no way it's not affected us more than most, even the injuries are possibly a sign of this.
And we have had the ground bollocks.
But these things aren't forcing Poch to pick certain players over others. The bullshit "paid to train" mantra has been changed to "if I paid 30m for you you can play no matter how shit you train". Playing at Wembley doesn't force him to choose poor tactics. The WC should have been an opportunity to give young players more game time, not marginalise them.
Even if you disagree with my personal player selection gripes, I'm sure you'll all have your own. Tripper, Rose, Davies, Lloris....whoever.
Now, maybe we'll smash the last 7 games, clear out the dross, sign some decent players and become the good version of a Pochettino team again. I don't even care if we don't make CL, as long as I can get on board with the way we are set up and play. Our cohesion as a team. I put much more stall in performances than I do trophies. As long as we look like a cohesive unit with and without the ball, I'm pretty happy.
And these are not sudden issues because we're on a bad run. I voiced many of them last season, and at the beginning of this season (and the middle) when we were winning games but not playing well. Many of us were getting shit for saying that results won't always outrun performances.
If we get back on track then I'll give him lots of credit, as I have for the great things he's done previously and the massive overall effect for the positive he's had on this club. But right now I'm just calling what I see and feel.
Last edited:
Bardi
I don't agree with some of the points but it is beautifully written. I still feal that his one big failure was the handling of Kyle walker who to my mind should of been club captain.
Ten Hag?
And your point?
Unfortunately, yes. If it was over now we'd still get fourth. We won't be top four in seven games.
I thought I had made my point. Is there anything else that needed to be added?
The squad is now in need of such drastic surgery that the window of opportunity to win the league has surely passed us by. It's a tragedy.