When I talk about Levy backing the manager, I mean having a coherent transfer policy that includes the timely selling of players. Too often, Levy has held out for the highest fee or until the last minute, which hampers the manager's ability to properly rebuild the squad. Players who were not going to extend should have been sold in the last 2 summer windows and replaced, but were not as Levy held out for his price, or in some cases (Wanyama), tried to squeeze out a couple of million quid extra at the last minute. The results of this policy are there for all to see.
not quarreling with that at all. I was just countering the "for a rebuild to happen" bit. Levy has set about rebuilding a number of times now - but he hasn't backed the manager in the way you describe. and that's been my point. Levy has always bought players that we could sell on at a profit (even if we haven't sold them), and never paid top dollar for players at their peak. that has meant buying prospective talent, rather than the specific player for the specific role in a specific manager's specific plan (i.e., a van Dijk-type buy). yet in Ramos, AVB, etc., he has employed managers who need specific players for specific roles, and when they don't get them, they fail. we'd always done better with the 'get-on-with-it'-type gaffers like Jol and Redknapp. … until Poch. he's the one 'project' manager that Levy's brought in who has succeeded with what he's been given. but he's taken us to a point where he can say "I need this one and that one to go one place better" - and fair enough. Levy's tried to accommodate him this summer … but he just can't help himself, can he? he did ok with Ndomele, but the Lo Celso thing was pure DL. so what does Poch do now? if he's prepared to carry on with Levy doing a bit better … but still being Levy, that's great by me. But if he's not - if he needs the players he needs when he needs them - well, as you've said, that's just not what Levy does. and I'd prefer we just continue getting players as we have and having a gaffer that'll get on with it, rather than Levy going out and selling the most promising manager available on some new Spurs project that, again, won't be backed come the first (and all subsequent) window. I would absolutely prefer that to having Levy spend money that the club doesn't have. I don't think he's been taking money out of the club, i.e. the Glazers at ManU. He makes money, and puts it straight back into the club. I don't think there's much more you can ask, because asking him to jeopardize the club's financial future is a step too far. in my opinion, of course.
Poch now saying he doesn't want to bring any new players in this January. https://www.skysports.com/football/...o-expects-no-january-transfer-window-business
Typical manager-speak that. Remember the summer of 2018 when he went from saying he was going to bring in 5 players, to "we don't need anyone else" a few days later when it was clear Levy wasn't going to back him in the market?
It's going to take more than one window to remake the team - it would be foolish not to get started in January.
January is the worst time to rebuild your squad. Teams don't want to sell their players in the middle of the season and prices are exhorbitant. All this talk of rebuilding the squad in January is wishful thinking, that should have been taken care of the last two summers, but the chairman wasn't interested.
One player who barely played the season he was signed. I am talking about selling and buying multiple players, that never happens in January.
I think that they should sell anyone who is out of contract, if there are any takers. The chances of getting somebody as good as Lucas are slim, but it would be foolish to not be shopping around. Or maybe, come January, the squad will be playing great and nobody would want to make changes...
Based on the last two games, it looks like the players are starting to come out of their collective comas, but it is just 2 games and we have already seen a couple of false dawns this season. At this point, changing the manager would make no sense, unless results continue to decline. The league campaign is just about gone, we are closer to the bottom than the top 4, so the priority has to be CL, the FA Cup and letting the manager rebuild the squad for next season - IF the chairman finally backs him, which is still a massive doubt for me. Right now, we are on pace for our worst league campaign since 2007-08, when we finished 11th on 46 points. I had to do a double-take when I saw that stat, a lot of newer-gen Spurs fan will have never known mediocre Tottenham sides.
I'm starting to think that Poch will take himself to another team rather than get fired. He's sick of a chairman who does not deliver what's needed. He's going to move on to a more ambitious club. I can't say I blame him.
I started following Spurs around 2001-2002. I remember how excited some of the old timers here were (years later) when we made it into the Europa league (or whatever it was called back then). We will be lucky to make it into Europa league this season, and even if we do it will be a disappointment. How things have changed.
Good points. When Marin Jol led us to 5th in the 2005-06 season, it was the first time we had finished in the top 5 in the league in 16 years and the first time we had qualified for Europe from our league position since the 1982-83 season.
If the Real job comes open, I think Levy will have a tough time keeping him and I wouldn't be surprised if Kane followed him there. Levy has done well scrounging a few extra million quid here and there on transfers and inflating his own salary, but it has come at the expense of the first team and the results this season are there for all to see.
It will take several windows of restocking the team with talent to reverse the effects of underspending the last few years. The Magnificent 7 approach didn't pan out, and there won't be any money to fund that sort of thing, anyway.
To be fair to Levy, he really can't win. I mean, we've let ourselves get into a very bad position by allowing some of our key players to run down their contracts; but when we did the opposite, i.e, Berba, Modric, Bale, etc., Levy got killed for his small-time 'selling club' lack of ambition. Well, he's put his foot down, as so many demanded, and now we're going to pay for it. For a while, actually.
Seems like the situation is that no other team will pay for a player with only a year left on his contract; they will just wait to get him on a free transfer. So you need to get a contract extension when there are still 2 years remaining on the contract - and if the player won't accept your offer, sell them immediately. Meaning we should have sold Eriksen and Alderwiereld in summer of 2018. The club had made offers to both of them, and they wouldn't accept. If you are offering somebody a raise and more years, and they don't accept, the writing's on the wall.
And I think that explains Poch's various "I'm not happy" comments at the start of the 2018-19 season. He could already see the writing on the wall towards the end of the 2017-18 season, when he froze Alderweireld out of the team during the run-in because he wouldn't extend. I was convinced that he would be sold during that summer and was shocked when it didn't transpire. Manchester United had offered £40 million for him but Levy held out for £55 million. At one point Eriksen was wotrh around £130 million. Now he is going to get nothing for both of them. For all of his so-called business acumen, Levy has snookered himself with these two.
I thought he did very well with those players and thought he would do likewise with Toby, Eriksen et al. The problem is, there is never a coherent plan to replace the departures. With Levy, it is always puchases and sales at the last minute, which doesn't leave the club with enough time to properly rebuild the squad. When you look around Europe, all the top teams take care of the bulk of their business well before the transfer deadline. We are the only top team that does our transfer business this way and the results show that this is not conducive to winning big trophies. Maybe this policy works well with the bottom line, but it doesn't help the manager or the squad.
I agree with this, too, though if we had won the CL last year, everyone would say it was brilliant. I can't give Levy too much credit on that, because I don't think he saw us making the CL final.
Even then, Eriksen had already put his house up for sale in London and was a no-show in the final. As for the CL, it was a blast, but being objective, I can't say we played our best football to get there. I thought Redknapp's side that got to the quarters in 2010-11 and our more recent team that lost to Juve in the round of 16 actually played much better football. In knockout competitions, it is not always the best team that wins. Think about closer to home. How many people before the NBA, NHL and MLB seasons began had the Raptors, the Blues and the Nationals (if they win tonight) as champions?
yeah, I definitely agree with that. my last post had actually been quite a bit longer, but it was getting long-winded, so I wound it back. and that was the criticism of Levy's modus operandi that I leveled, as well. I won't quarrel with the amounts that he spends, but the way he does it is can be frustrating. that he can be penny-wise and pound-foolish is apparent, and has been for a long time.
It is starting to look like Saturday's fixture at the Dildo Dome could be Poch's last as Spurs manager. The English press is full of stories about his imminent departure and there are reports that the players on international duty have been texting each other about the gaffer's imminent demise. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/footbal...no-leaves-tottenham-hotspur-could-contenders/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/footbal...no-holds-crisis-talks-daniel-levy-tottenhams/ https://www.theguardian.com/football/2019/nov/19/tottenham-hotspur-mauricio-pochettino-exit-route