And this time, it's key that we get it right. If we actually get someone with experience whose CV shows they are up to the job, we might actually hold onto everyone. They're more likely to stay for another season if they can see the club is bringing in a coach who has the ambition, as well as the proof of being a winner. If not, it's likely to be another summer of departures and new faces. We simply wont progress if we carry on like it. When will we learn?
InsideFutbol are reporting it too. I wouldn't be against De Boer, but it's a risk, which i'm not sure we can afford. Laudrup being the example. Edit: I read this morning that De Boer said he'd not had an approach. Now, he's supposed to have said this: "Spurs have made an approach. I'll think about it. I'll talk to them and listen to what they have to say".
For me, the standout candidate was Hiddink, purely down to experience and the winning mentality. With him seemingly gone, de Boer was my next target. One of the best young managers in Europe known for playing a good brand of football. His experience with Super Jan and the Great Dane can also be key in getting the best out of them (and others). Really hope it's true. For me, he's a perfect fit. Appreciate it's a risk due to his inexperience but I still think he'd command a lot of respect from the players due to his playing career and thus far successful management career and something to me just clicks at thought of FDB and Spurs.
If it is him, I hope he gets 3 years to really build something. Only possible relegation should be a reason to fire a manager once selected in the short term.
If de Boer does take over, then he needs to be allowed to make the team his own, be encouraged to bring through youth players and be given the right calibre of staff. The Ajax approach should be adopted throughout the club and we shouldn't get completely hung up on results for a while. Doesn't sound like he fancies becoming a tax dodger much: "Spurs have made an approach. After the last league game I ll think about it. I’ll talk to them and listen what they have to say. I see opportunities at Tottenham. Just as Liverpool and Newcastle, they are sleeping giants. I want to add something to a club so that people can say that they see the hand of Frank de Boer. Liverpool is a good example of this. What Brendan Rodgers is doing there is an example [for me]… Monaco means nothing to me." Not sure about having a manager that talks about himself in the third person, though. It's all a bit Carlton Palmer!
AVB was one of the most promising coaches in football and then he joined Chelsea. The trouble is that across the rest of Europe they appreciate the art of football whilst we value results over everything. Simeone has At. Madrid playing football that's far superior to anything in England and Chelsea still managed to shut them out a make a bad game of it. That kind of play happens every weekend here so if a foreign manager is to come in and be a success they need to be prepared to sacrifice their style to get consistent results. Personally I'd prefer style over success and if our next manager, whoever it is, gets us playing attractive football then I'm happy to go along for the ride wherever we are in the table. If we can't afford the kind of money it takes to duke it out at the top of the table with the money bags then let them keep their top 4 finishes, we'll play good football and enjoy our European adventures in the EL.
Michiel Jongsma @JongsmaJongsma · 12m Ajax have admitted Tottenham Hotspur have made a formal approach for Frank de Boer. (via @Niiwino & @FOXSportsnl) Michiel Jongsma @JongsmaJongsma · 11m Frank de Boer has said that he is open to talks with the North London club, saying he wants to 'talk and listen', via @Niiwino . Michiel Jongsma @JongsmaJongsma · 8m Frank de Boer on his next step: 'I want to add something to a club, build something. - I won't be talking to other clubs til after May 3.'. Michiel Jongsma @JongsmaJongsma · 8m De Boer: 'I see a perspective at Tottenham Hotspur, just as Liverpool and Newcastle United sometimes are, they are sleeping giants'. (NOS) Michiel Jongsma @JongsmaJongsma · 7m Frank de Boer is not denying an approach of Monaco, but indicates he is more open to a club like Tottenham Hotspur. (via @NOS) Kristof Terreur ‏@HLNinEngeland 5m De Boer: "Spurs have made an approach. After the last league game I ll think about it. I ll talk to them and listen what they have to say."
I agree. I'm used to us winning nothing. In my 20+ years as a fan, we've won 2 cups. But I started following spurs as a club BECAUSE of the style of football. (Which actually got very poor for quite a while after! ) Whilst I appreciate that de Boer is at Ajax and should be winning nearly all of the time, his defeat percentage is 10%. - which is very good. He seems to combine attractive football and results and knows how to not get beaten, most of the time. - I wonder why that might be?! He seems like a great fit. I just hope he's given time, should he become our boss.
And so were Ossie sides for a while. I would say that pragmatism is a desirable trait in a good manager. And it only comes with long-term experience.
Couldn't disagree more YV, I think at Spurs we are very aware of the art of football, in fact my critisism of AVB was his boring football. There is far more boring football in Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, than there is in England, IMHO. Apart from Arsenal pre Wenger and Revie's Leeds we are not famous for defensive football such as Italy made their own. Mourinho or Benitez you can keep their brand of football as far as I am concerned, even though they get results.
Benitez is actually fairly attacking in Naples, strangely enough, Spurf. Might be playing to the strengths of their squad. The most offensive thing about them this season is their away kit, though: please log in to view this image
I said de Boer was one of a handful I'd take over Sherwood. He's top of my list, now that I think about it, though I'm no expert on our coaching options. It would be great, first, if we got him (I have no idea if we will), and, second, that we made attractive football our first goal. Sherwood has made major steps in the right direction. He's got the team scoring, and brought out the quality in what may be our two highest quality players. On the other hand, the way the team plays still isn't as attractive as Southampton or Everton, for example. So (assuming de Boer comes here) just ignore me when I call for him to be sacked after every loss... I think we might just have the most talented squad we've had recently--but it's not nearly as good a team as the last one Harry had. Whatever our coaching shortcomings, we had a much more massive problem this year in trying to come up with a starting lineup or lineups and appropriate style or styles of play thanks to all the incoming and outgoing traffic. Really, it's only the last five or six games that we seem to have them (and even that is far from certain). We have much more talented players who aren't playing, so much more depth in theory. But the starting 11 isn't nearly as good as Harry's, and his starting 11 named itself at the beginning of the season for the most part. The best manager in the world might have had a hard time deciding what combination of Eiriksen, Soldado, Adebayor, Lamela, Lennon, Paulinho, Dembele, Capoue, Sandro, Chadli and Townsend should play. (I've got to say I feel guilty about jumping on the sack Sherwood, hire de Boer bandwagon, though. There aren't a lot of us in Sherwood's camp.)
Adebayor, got us scoring goals, and before you say he messed the defence up it went before he came brought a few youngsters through Kane/Bentaleb/Fryers (not sure they'll be good enough but willing to give them more time than Soldado/Paulinho who are proven internationals but clearly cant hack it in the premier league) Other than that cant think of anything Not saying Sherwood should get the job (I hope he doesn't), in my opinion he's done ok but ok's not good enough for top 4. Its his first major job so very inexperienced, if you got offered the spurs job for 18 months would you turn it down? But if you seriously think a different manager would've got us top 4 with that squad you've got your head buried in the sand
I wonder how Ajax fans will feel about us if this actually goes through? Vertonghen, Eriksen and possibly de Boer?
I don't think you understand what I meant, and I wasn't talking about boring/entertaining football. The point that I was making is that coaches like AVB tend to be more appreciated on the continent because they're less likely to face 2 banks of 4 just sitting in their own half all game. AVB wouldn't have been considered boring if you just looked at our European games under him. We certainly weren't boring when we smashed Inter 3-0, or went 2 up top in the second leg(no matter how bad that decision was). AVB also wasn't boring when he was at Porto setting his team up to be a freescoring and all conquering side and he isn't boring at Zenit where his team averages 3 goals a game, compared to less than 2 goals a game before he joined. I'm not pretending AVB didn't get the balance wrong in the PL because he clearly did and he also took too long to adapt his preferred style of play to one that works better in our league. But the reason the way he set up didn't lead to us scoring as freely as the sides he's managed abroad is that other countries don't have West Hams, Stokes and Cardiffs that will set up with 8 big fellas at the back to bully the attackers and rotate fouls to get whatever they can out of the game. Teams still set up defensively against Barca/Bayern/Real but they don't sign players for the purpose of unsettling other teams and when they're not against the big clubs they tend to give attacking a go, rather than honing their negative football. Put AVB's Tottenham in Spain and we wouldn't look like a dull team. Italian football is only dull to the British(perhaps the Germans too) who like 90 minutes of players rushing around and barging eachother. Italian football has always had a lot of creativity to it, inventing positions that are later picked up on by the rest of World football. Italy can produce boring sides, of course, but for every dull defensive side there's an attacking side with a number of players with great technique. It was only at the Euros that we saw who the dull side was when English and Italian football was stacked side by side to compare. We set our best attacking player up to stiffle their best creative player and proceeded to play hoofball until we got knocked out on penalties.
Anyway, my point was that a coach who is known for playing attractive football abroad better be prepared to find that what worked there will not work so well here.
