My point is, RCL, a lot of Spurs fans were well chuffed with your summer transfer business and felt you’d added quality additions to a fairly strong squad.
Now, obviously, you may say that fans are always going to be optimistic when they have an active transfer window. But some of these players you acquired were highly sought after across Europe - Reguilon, Bergwijn, Ndombele, Lo Celso - were all linked with some very good sides. You were able to get Bale on loan too, who has shown glimpses of what he’s capable of.
Most of the things you’re saying now is with the benefit of hindsight.
I still think these players haven’t just turned into ****. The environment, the poor tactics and squad management by Mourinho and the lack of identity that wasn’t instilled in your team is what has contributed to their failings.
I’m confident most of these players could go to a more stable environment and a manager would optimise their abilities.
You make some good points here Brunel, and yes much of what we moan about is with hindsight. I don't think anyone could have predicted just how bad Doherty would be, nor that Ndombele and Lo Celso would regress rather than progress in their 2nd season with the club, nor that Bergwijn would lose every shred of confidence and go something like 41 matches without scoring until today.
But there is an issue of failing to address obvious holes in the squad, spending the bulk of transfer windows on what I would call 'vanity signings' in the sense that we're either already over-stocked in those areas or the player has huge question marks over them (usually due to youth/inexperience).
In Poch's last summer window, we urgently needed replacements for Trippier, Eriksen, Dembele and Wanyama, plus backup for Kane. That was it. Five players. We brought in Lo Celso and Tanguy to replace Eriksen and Dembele, but failed to bring in a DM, RB or a backup for Kane, and suffered greatly as a result. We went for two 'vanity signings' in Sessegnon and Clarke for a combined total of £40m. Neither of them were needed at the time and so time has proven - we've barely seen them in 2 whole years. That £40m would have been infinitely better served where we actually needed it most - at DM, RB and ST. By failing to address 3 urgent areas, we created a backlog of urgency leading into Maureen's reign...
I know it is difficult to judge January windows, but Bergwijn's arrival in Maureen's first window was, in the grander scheme of things, utterly pointless. Yes, he has suitors across Europe and yes, there is probably a good player in there somewhere...but we didn't need him! AM is the one area of the squad we've been overloaded in for years! So we went into that Jan window
still needing a RB, DM and ST and finished it with another AM to add to Lamela, Son, Lucas, Lo Celso, Clarke and Dele.
Then came last summer. By now, the 'urgent' list has grown to include at least 1 CB, plus a LB. Our business went:
DM - done
LB - done
RB - done
ST - done
CB - not done
It was so nearly there. By focusing on bringing in a top CB instead of pissing about signing Bale and Hart before eventually settling on Rodon, something might have been salvaged of this season. As it is, we now have 8 (EIGHT) attacking midfielders on our books: Son, Bale, Lucas, Lamela, Bergwijn, Dele, Clarke, Lo Celso. Nine if you count Sessegnon.
The overall lack of forward planning is deeply worrying. It is clear that the club knows which areas need urgent attention. It is entirely unclear as to why we ignore those issues across multiple windows, either hoping for the best (cf. Foyth and Tanganga playing as RBs for an entire season or Dele Alli playing as a lone striker) or attempting to fix them with last-minute cheap n cheerful solutions (cf. Rodon).
