SN Blog 118 – Results are bad but the situation is worse

I wrote a blog about a week ago where I defended Ange Postecoglou and in my opinion shifted the blame for the current mess onto the board.  My view is simple; you can like or dislike Ange’s style and that is opinion and we all have them but we can all agree when lots of different managers, with lots of different styles using lots of different players across many season keep running into the same problems then it is NOT them that is the problem.

As far back as I can remember we have come up short when trying to recruit and I must admit on this occasion they actually suckered me in and I believed this new setup and plan was going to be good for us, in reality its only good for ENIC.

Ignoring the league table currently I believe most of us would agree, even their fans begrudgingly, that due to history and size etc Tottenham are a bigger club than Brighton.  The two clubs SHOULD have differing ambitions when it comes to what is “success” and Brighton have shown through good management on and off the pitch a club can not only come up through the leagues to the top flight but sustain a place there on merit.

The key component to their success has been the excellent recruitment.  They have used a data model for finding players and have brought them in and played them and then sold them for substantial profit and replaced them again and kept moving forward.

Tottenham’s recruitment has been flawed for years and past efforts by people to change things have often led to butting heads with Mr Levy and changes are made and off we go again.  These changes now were all set to revolutionise how we recruit and last summer was the first window using this new system.

I think we can all agree a very good window.  Maddison, Vicario, Van de Ven … all excellent and well scouted with most Spurs fans only knowing of Maddison before we were linked with the other two.

It was this that got me excited for this model as it was identifying players using the data that can play in a system for Ange and improve us and so when this summer was happening… when we recruited again I was thinking good, these are people I am sure will have an impact but in reality what happened this last summer was we recruited for the future – not now!

Teenagers like Gray, Bergvall and Odobert are all excellent prospects and can have an impact around the squad for sure this season and are however none of them are the ready made first team players that we need to fill out a squad competing in four competitions and basically playing two games a week every week…

So why is it I feel duped by this new model .. well simple.  The club are looking at re-sale not footballing success.  Gray is an excellent player who will likely all in cost us around £50m with the add on’s in the deal which he will surely meet criteria for… and he is 18… injuries willing he will be in his prime in about four years when he will have just two years left on his deal with us and MANY clubs who are winning trophies circling to buy him for £100m+

The Brighton model indeed…

I believed what Brighton are doing is excellent but they know if they want to take the next step from being just a permanent team in the Prem to competing for honours they needs to be able to keep their best players and have a financial model not dependent on selling.

You know a financial model like a big club… a club who have a stadium that generates the highest revenue of any sporting stadium in Europe and one of the top three in the world… perhaps a club that has the lowest wages to income percentage in the Premier League…. you know… like Tottenham.

We lost 2-1 to Newcastle a club who have the financial power to buy Man City just to call them Geordies B Team and laugh at them and then still have money left to buy other stuff too… If you do not believe me Google the comparitive net worth of the Newcastle owners and the Man City owners; its enough to make you cry … but due to financial regulations they have been having to buy a few at a time as putting to much in to fast would see them breach.

With the Man City case rumbling on clubs like Newcastle will be watching that closely hoping that if it goes the way of City they can unleash their full buying power upon the world and suddenly the transfer market will be inflated beyond measure.

Whilst they and currently Chelsea are keeping one eye on City it is an opportunity, you would think, for a well run club to jump ahead of them and secure players who can make an impact in the Premier league now to help a team and help a manager who are decimated by injuries and are about to see the whole season fall apart!

However today the club moved to sign a largely unknown 21yr old goal keeper from Slavia Prague to help Ange out.  A player who will take up a foreign player slot, meaning to be added to the Europa League squad someone will need to be dropped … and the the strange decisions from the club just keep coming.

What I do know from experience is the club will soon fire the manager.  Results are not good and that is true, they are not.  It has been a poor season but the new man coming in will inherit a squad that is a mess, injured and with the manager they all love sacked morale will be in the toilet even worse than it likely is now.  You can tell the players love and want this to work by the way simply by body language and the sheer effort all of them to a man (or boy) are putting into every game.

None of them are shirking, none of them are clearly downing tools which is what you see with all managers when their time is up, even Pochettino.

So in my opinion Ange will get sacked, a group of our fan base will be happy and Levy will let Mason take charge and the last two seasons once again will have been wasted and a new project starts in the summer with another new manager, with his own ideas and his own type of players he will want and the re-build starts and we all say it needs time.. and he wont get it and rinse and repeat.

Then when we sell Bergvall, Gray, Odobert and others for a decent return maybe someone will remember reading this and think damn.

 

-Admin SJ

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