Genuine question, is there a referee whose name doesn't draw dark murmuring when he's assigned to our games?
I wonder who the Liverpool ref is on Saturday. Oh, hang on a minute they're not playing on Saturday! Liverpool on TV shock!
I'm probably in the minority opinion here but whilst I absolutely didn't want AVB after Harry, he was to a large extent a victim of circumstances completely beyond his control. From day 1 when he was handed second-rate replacements for the irreplaceable King, Modric and VDV and told instead to place a Gareth Bale-sized plaster over the many cracks in the squad, he nonetheless delivered a very memorable season during which we finally broke the Old Trafford curse, reached the quarter finals of the EL (the furthest we've ever got) where we were narrowly knocked out on penalties, scored our highest ever points tally, and - talking of unbeaten runs coming to an end - we put together a 12-game run of W8 D4 literally in the middle of the season when the weather is awful (memories of Dempsey's last minute equaliser against United in the blizzard anyone?) and the fixture list jam packed. It's always easy to play the 'what if' game, but what followed in the farcical transfer window of 2013 more or less crippled him as a manager. With hindsight, we now know that 4 of the 7 players he was handed instead of 'Elvis' weren't just subjectively bad under him, they were objectively not good enough for the club's aspirations. And, as has been pointed out many times on here, to be expected to integrate 7 new players in one window was utter madness. When he did leave, I had a lot of sympathy for him. My anger was far more directed at Levy for overseeing such a shambolic period of a real comedy of errors.
Much of that is why I am a supporter of Pochettino. The contrast of the young squad full of potential that we have now with that so recent an era makes that period seem long long ago. As I said right at the beginning of the season I am more optimistic for the near future of this Spurs team. The feeling that Jol brought when many of us felt that, at last, Spurs were heading in the right direction again has for me returned with Mauricio Pochettino.
I'd agree with most of this. I was initially sceptical of Pochettino, but I've come around to thinking that we're finally headed in the right direction. I never, ever had that feeling under AVB. Yes, they were Bale sized cracks, all papered over by Bale too. If not for him in that season, I wonder where we would have finished?! The football AVB gave us was boring, regimented dross that you could see most of the players had no faith in either. I'm very happy to celebrate the anniversary of us getting rid of Mr. Anti- football.
What Pochettino has achieved is the re-unification of the club. Levy trusts him enough to give him the last word on transfers. Imagine Martin Jol without the handicap of Commolli's purchasing players we didn't need instead of the ones that we did. The same goes for AVB dealing with Baldini's purchases, The young players from the Academy know that they are going to get chances if they deserve it and not 'be left to rot on the vine' as they would have been under Harry Redknapp as he went out to buy Rio Ferdinand. The senior player see a way that we can produce a competitive squad from the talented young guns and I think that Dembele, Vertonghen and Hugo are more optimistic and effective as a result. We're not picking injured players and those returning from injury have to be really fit and deserving of being put into the team. My only gripe is how we ended up going into a season with 1 striker. Totally bonkers and given that we knew full well and well before the end of the season that we were getting rid of Soldado and that Adebayor had no possible future at the club, it was totally unnecessary and avoidable. That smacks of amateurism because we are and will continue to suffer as a result of it. Buying quality in January is going to be very difficult and even more expensive than in the summer. If we fail, I see 4th or better as evading our grasp. whereas if we'd bought someone I think we'd have walked it (relatively).
I agree totally with the above comments on Poch, my only fear I that some big moneybags club comes along and tries to prize him away from us. The January window is always ****e. There is one player that I would like us to try and have a look at if we sell Townsend and that's the Congolese chap Bolassie, a direct replacement in more ways than one, he is far more direct. He's fast, runs all day and I think would fit in our side really well. Talking of the Congo, I'm bleedin' stuck here for Christmas. I must have done something really bad in a previous life, like genocide, serial killing or supported the Ar5ena1. No on second thoughts if I'd have supported the Ar5ena1, I'd have probably ended up in Syria under ISIS. This place is bad, but there are definitely worst places. The Congo is more scary than anything. Often get woken by the sound of gunfire but none off the expats have ever been hit, just a few of the locals. I've just driven down from lunch and at the side of the road there was a a couple of guys in cammo with a machine gun set up on a tripod with the gun pointing into the road. ****es you up a bit. They were just standing talking but you never know, I didn't hang around to ask them what they were doing, just drove past and reported them to security on my arrival at the office. They're probably harmless, just skiving off, but you never know. Have a very merry Christmas and an unbeaten new year. COYS!!!
It would have been even more bonkers to sign someone who didn't meet Pochettino's criteria on having high work ethic and fitness. That could have wrecked the whole plan.
Ahhh the Congo !!! I have done a bit of work out there in Pointe Noire, beautiful place haha!! To be fair though I found it a lot safer than when I was working in Nigeria....now there's a dodgy place !!! not so much in Lagos but in Port Harcourt and Onne. We had fully armed security at all times. I remember once being in the mini-bus going from Port Harcourt to Onne and the bus was bouncing all over the road(dirt track) I asked the driver to slow down but the security guard said " if bus slow down you get kidnapped" my response, " go ****ing faster then ". I've also had the joys of working Angola, Equatorial Guinea all wonderful places haha!. Work now takes me to Australia for four weeks at a time, but its fly home day tomorrow !! Stay safe deedub have agreat xmas and new year !
I just can't accept that. We identified Berahino as fitting the bill. Also, it's very likely that we bid for Martial and I would expect there were others. So, players were available but we failed to land them. If there is any truth to the rumours that we offered £5m up front for Berahino and the rest dependent upon performance related criteria, then no wonder we got nowhere. This kid is the best prospect they've had in decades. Would we sell Kane for £20m up front plus further payments down the line IF he stayed fit and trained on? No chance. It was doomed to failure and we left it so late that we signed nobody. I recall us selling Berbatov on the last day and having to take Frazier bloody Campbell on loan to replace him. We know the danger of doing business last minute only too well. If Harry Kane had broken his leg the day after the window closed what the hell would we have done then?
So you are saying that we should pay more than we think players are worth? Berahino is overpriced even at our offer as far as I can see. Playing someone like Son, Njie, Chadli, Lamela or even Dier as an emergency striker is much better than paying over the odds. Its impossible to sign everyone we need.
Strikers are overpriced, particularly if the potential seller sees the prospective purchaser is desperate. Look at what we paid for Soldado or Liverpool paid for Benteke or Man Utd for Martial. Berahino's English so that immediately ups the ante. Whether he is my choice or yours is immaterial. We went for him and others and came home empty handed again. Since Berbatov left we've been trying and failing to land a decent striker. The continued failure is poor by any measure. Still Mourinho's been sacked and I'm smiling today.
We need a good striker, simple as. Decent Strikers don't come cheap, fact! Whether it's Berahino or somebody else, Levy needs to get his finger out of his arse for once, and get it sorted!
I should have said the DRC (Dirty Rotten Congo) not the Republic of the Congo, hey, that's a bit upmarket! Ha Ha. Eastern DRC to boot, not far from Burundi where a civil war is just about to break out methinks, always happens at election time. Elections are due to be held in the DRC next year too, god help us, just hope the M23's or some kind of reincarnation don't resurface. We keep a small house across the border in Rwanda just in case we have to leggit. The gem of Africa Rwanda, so much money has gone in since the genicide, it's almost like a western country (even the roads!!!). I'd love to work there, or even Uganda, Lake Victoria, down at Entebbe is stunning. I was once offered a job in Nigeria by a consultant working for one of the oil companies down in the Delta, he told me that you might get kidnapped, but don't worry because we always pay the ransom and they treat you relatively well. The money was top notch, US$1000 a day tax free, twice what I was on at the time, so I kind of considered it. When I received the job offer I was working with a Nigerian chap who came from one of the Nigerian ruling families, so I sought his advice. His reply to 'what's it like working in Nigeria', was 'to be avoided at all costs, why do you think i'm working here?'. I ended up taking a job in Eritrea, which is a fantastic country to be an Ex Pat in, not so good if you're Eritrean because you have to spend most of your life in the Army on little or no money. That was a life changer, Eritrean women are very beautiful and I met my second wife there. I moved on and worked in Liberia but fell out with a guy claiming to be one of the Sirleafs, he said that he was the Minister of Labour (I checked on Wiki and he wasn't) but he demanded income tax off me and four of my staff. I explained that our salaries were net of tax and if any money was owed to the govenment, he needed to visit our lawyer in Monrovia who would give him a cheque. He got pretty angry and demanded cash there and then or i'd be locked up. With that threat I had nothing to lose so I told him to "go forth and multiply" , which he did, muttering threats on his way. He said his name was Boakai Sirleaf but that's probably made up, Joseph Boakai is the Vice President and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf is the President. Having said that he must have had some sort of power or influence because when I applied for my next visa it was refused. **** country anyway. From there I went to Sierra Leone, an interesting country, far better than Liberia. Managed to break my leg there so it didn't last long, shame, I would love to go back, poor but very nice friendly people. However, every clould has a silver lining, the wife fell pregnant during my recouperation, hence the avitar. Work now takes me to the DRC, building a tailings dam on a gold mine, what line of work takes you to Austrailia TillIDie? 4 on and 4 off sounds a bit like an Austrailian mine rota to me.
The added problem is the January window inflates the fee for strikers, hence we're seeing fees like £21m for Embolo or £25m+ for Batshuayi being quoted, as clubs don't want to lose a major asset with half the season to play (unless said asset has six months left on their contract, obviously)
Absolutely. If we decided to leave it and come back in January then that was a poor decision and completely predictable. That's what i don't get. What do we think is going to happen next summer when PL clubs are getting even more TV money? Prices are going to go up as they always do. We shouldn't have bought Clinton N'Jie if we were short of cash. He's a calculated gamble that he'll improve. That money should have been added to the sale of Fazio and Townsend and we should have bought the best player available. If he's not perfect then sell him on again. Even if we took a gamble on someone from a lower league. Even if we just used the player in the last 20 minutes of games to chase things as Kane tires. Going into a season with only 1 striker is just ridiculous. It's potentially damaging to Harry Kane's fitness and unfair to the rest of the team. I'm sure Hugo wasn't expecting us to something daft like that. We've hobbled ourselves in a year when we should be making a leap forward.
The laws of the market apply, as they do in any business. To paraphrase the words of my old business, 'Top Strikers are well,bid'. In other words there are more buyers than sellers for good strikers. Hence sellers can pretty much ask what they want for them.
