Purely because they screwed up slightly more than we did. I'm still trying to work out just how we finished fifth by scoring 58 goals and conceding 53, whilst playing some of the most hapless, boring football I've ever seen from a Spurs side.
Er..no, I don't think so! More like Liverpool screwed up just a tad more than we did. We conceded more goals than just about any side not in the relegation zone.
Judging by the players he's cited, I think Power is referring to Frank Arnesen, who was our director of football in the 2004-5 season. He was probably our first experiment with the 'continental' set up - Commoli and Baldini have been the latest incarnations of this much maligned way of doing things. However, unlike the latter, Arnesen was by all means a very astute man who convinced Levy to ditch Santini and appoint BMJ - probably the best managerial appointment at the club since El Tel. He was also instrumental in overseeing the scouting process for players like Berbatov, Carrick, Zokora, Davids etc all of whom helped us to push on to another level. He was illegally poached by Chelsea at the end of the season, for which we won £8m in compensation from Roman. Our relationship with Chelsea has been 'prickly' ever since. It is telling that when Arnesen left Chelsea in 2010, what followed was without question their worst spell in the PL under Abramovich, failing to win the league for 4 consequtive seasons and even finishing below us on one occasion yet still getting CL football by boring Europe's top aides to death. I've always thought that Arnesen's brief but tremendously successful tenure here is the main resin Levy keeps returning to the DOF fetish he has. However, it is demonstrably clear that out DOF's are getting worse with time rather than better.
Cf. the famous 1998-9 'miracle season' where Harry led West Ham to their highest ever PL finish of 5th place and thereby cemented himself a reputation of being a terrific manager. Their stats that season? Pts: 57 GF: 46 GA; 53 Top scorer was Ian Wright with a staggering 9 goals. I'm NOT aiming a pop at Harry by the way, nor do I think we need another debate revolving around his time here. I am however using these stats to once again demonstrate that so much of a manager's success is dependent on being in the right place at the right time. Harry took on West Ham when the league was probably the weakest it's ever been. Pochettino took over Spurs with a squad overflowing with duds, as this embarrassing transfer window has thus far demonstrated. If the football doesn't show drastic signs of improvement as this season progresses, he deserves the criticism. But let's not hold him accountable for the appalling judgement of Messrs Baldini and Boas.
This has been an old argument about who decides what is needed by a team. In my view, it's the manager. In Power's view it's the DOF. personally, I've never seen the use of a DOF like Comolli, who when asked by the manager to find a striker, goes and buys say a midfielder. I've no great objection to the use of a DOF, as such. However, I feel they should there to identify the best targets for what those positions that the manager feels need strengthening. Not to override his wishes.
Looking at those stats, miracle is right! But it's more than that, in our case. We managed to bore the arse off most of our supporters whilst 'achieving' this 5th place. Like I said, I'm still trying to work out how we did it!
The role only works when the person in said role understands what they're doing. When we had Pleat as a DoF in the latter days of the Sugar Era, his brief was simple: bring in young players from the lower leagues on the cheap and see if they can be polished up. Simon Davies was certainly a good acquisition from this period (until the injuries piled up), Matthew Etheringon had a good Premier League career so he was a good signing (even if we never used him) - although Anthony Gardner and Gary Doherty showed the downside of this system, as they proved to be Championship-level players in a Premier League team. When we hired Arnesen, he clearly knew what he was doing: he suggested to Levy that we bring in Martin Jol as manager, only for Levy to get cold feet at the last minute and hire "big name" Jacques Santini, yet also bringing in Jol in a role that was never clearly defined. In terms of scouting players, his brief was to bring in young English talent who could make up the spine of the team, and that's what he brought in with the likes of Carrick, Dawson and Huddlestone who all became key players in the team - only to get spirited away when the Chavs tapped him up. In retrospect, Comolli was a train wreck in slow motion: first of all was the summer where he blatantly undermined Jol by flat out ignoring Jol's instructions (namely a defensive midfielder, a left winger, and a striker - but only if Mido and Defoe were sold) and pissed away a large amount of the club's money in doing so, and when he finally got his wish of working with Juande Ramos he proved inept in the transfer market - and paid for it. Baldini made similar mistakes to Comolli a couple of summers ago - and in the case of both Baldini and Comolli, I forget who said it yesterday, but they were dead on when saying that as soon as both Comolli and Baldini had someone else's money to throw around, they forgot their briefs and started playing Fantasy Football without considering the consequences. For example, if Baldini didn't get quite so giddy with the Bale money there were so many other options available, even though PSG and Monaco were doing their bit to further destabilise the transfer market that summer: up front we could've signed Bony for £12m, or he could've stuck to his guns and stated his case to bring in Benteke instead of AVB's preference for Soldado. Otamendi could've been brought in for around £15m at the time, while Alderweireld was available for just £3.5m, both of which would've improved our defnece - while sparing us the calamities of Chiriches or Fazio. Most of all, we needed to make key additions to replace Bale and the Modric-style player we needed for the entire previous season, yet we didn't.
Wholly agree, no-one should be over-riding anyone but finding good players is an incredibly difficult and time consuming job as is coaching a PL team and I'm just not convinced that anyone has the time and skill to do both.
I always thought it was the other way round with AVB preferring Benteke! The thought of Villas-Boas peacocking around at training thinking to himself 'A Soldado type player would seriously complement my system of inverted wingers and no support striker' just compounds my opinion that the man is the footballing equivalent of Krusty the Clown, just without the sense of humour.
On that, we can agree. They should work together as a team. It has just seemed that that hasn't been the case in the recent past.
There should be an extensive scouting system which is responsible for looking at players. The DoF should be attending to the detail of any proposed transfer - the money available to spend, the age/profile of the player sought etc and ultimately the fee to be paid, player's terms and the like, but surely the manager alone should decide if the player concerned fits the bill for the team.
I would add that I can't think of anything sillier that Levy has done than appoint Baldini a few days before we had to spend £100m. How anyone was supposed to get up to speed with the way the club worked, what we had already, how the manager wanted to play and sign the right players I don't know. But I still think that Capoue, Chiriches and Paulinho might well go on to do good things elsewhere. And I really can understand why we felt Soldado was a good player. Last year's signings were bit weird though although Vorm, Davies and Dier could prove astute and Fazio and Stambouli did little harm
But on what basis? If the scouts have watched him 20 or 30 times and think he fits the bill and the Dof thinks he's worth the money what can the manager actually add? He might watch him twice and he has a mare or is given the run around by Messi or similar.
The manager has to identify what he wants first of all, the scouts look at players, the DoF looks at what deals can be done, but ultimately the manager has to sign off any transfer, doesn't he? The manager must be trusted as the best judge of the player for his team. If Berahino is worth £20M+, that money can only be paid out if Pochettino sees where he fits into a team with Kane and Eriksen and whether he plays a role in the side. Does he have enough pace, does he want him to play as a lone striker or one of two, does he want him to drop deep or play on the shoulder of the last defender, is he the right temperament for a team contesting places at the top end of the PL? Would anyone have dared to make these sorts of evaluations on behalf of SAF or Clough?
It's a difference between a top-down system and a bottom-up one. Does the manager identify precise targets and send the detailed shopping list to his DOF and scouts saying 'this or as close to this, or nothing'. Or, do the DOF and scouts go off and return to the manager with a list of players they'd recommend for the club (which could be for a far broader variety of reasons than the manager; for instance their sell-on value, age, preventing rival clubs from snapping them up etc) saying 'find a way to fit these into your system'? Who holds the balance of power? Under Arnesen, it was Jol. Under Commoli, it was the reverse - he went off with his own version of what befitted the club. Levy trusted him and when it started to chafe he got Jol sacked and brought in Ramos. That was an example of a DOF with far too much power. Baldini has been a bit of both really. Although as HBIC pointed out it was madness giving him a £100m war chest at the same time as he collected his luggage from Heathrow.
Rondon looks a handful and at 12 mill, bargain. Why do we think we are above this kind of player!?! Would add some steel upfront for us...think we have an obsession with signing soft Kaants.
Don't get me started SL. Every time Gomis scores a fairy drops dead in Never-Never Land, the land where our transfer windows make sense. I get that real-life footy isn't as easy as a computer game, but our recruitment strategy is so comically inept that I sometimes wonder how I'd do as DoF at the mighty Spurs.
Dele Alli scored a goal within his 20th PL minute. He nutmegged Kroos and Modric in his first exhibition game. The young man is clearly out of his depth.
