Captaincy and leadership

Captaincy is a skill-based job; leadership is a facet of a player's own character. In order to be an effective captain, a player needs to have such a character. This character, allied to a player's mastery of his own game, and a high level of commitment to the club and the team, will enable the captain to carry out his duties on the pitch. Whilst I see the mastery of his own game from Hugo Lloris, I do not see much sign of the rest of the package. It's just not his style.

Watch a good captain at work, and you will see who is in charge on the pitch. I don't particularly care for any of them, but I recognise the captaincy/leadership dimension when I watch John Terry, Steven Gerrard, even Wayne Rooney. I don't see this at Spurs at the moment, although we've had good captains in the recent past.

And I don't think our current manager - much as I admire a lot of what he's done in a short space of time - has the right idea about captaincy, either. He seems to have a range of reasons for appointing people captain or vice-captain. If he does have a clear idea, I wonder what the common factor is for Younes Kaboul, Emmanuel Adebayor, Aaron Lennon and Hugo Lloris? I can't see one - unless Aaron Lennon was a fluent French-speaker. I suspect that in one case he was rewarding loyalty; in another trying to motivate; and in a third simply recognising the one player (at that time) consistently achieving a high level of performance. But these, as I say, are not reasons for making anyone captain. And it's not much good making someone captain who can't get in the team! That might work in golf or tennis, but it doesn't in football.

The reason I am raising this issue is that yesterday's game vs Man U was crying out for someone to take the Spurs side by the scruff of the neck and boss them around. And I mean on the field. The studio pundits provided good analysis of the tactical errors made by inexperienced players in our midfield/right side and central defence. A failure to prioritise within our marking, and a failure to cover a colleague under pressure - these could have been sorted out on the field (better if these problems had been anticipated in training, of course!). By a proper captain/leader. I mean, when I skippered a cricket team, if a batsman started to score too many runs through one particular place in the field, I'd change the fielding positions! And I didn't need a manager to tell me.

Sadly, I'm not sure there's any obvious candidate for the job. I would like to think we'll field the same team vs Leicester. I reckon it's our best line-up, and that yesterday's performance was largely a blip. The game revealed some weaknesses we've managed to cover up this season - but nothing that can't be put right with some knowledgeable input and a bit of hard work in training. But for me the leadership issue is fundamental. The same line-up means the same problem remains. As the senior outfield defender, Vertonghen ought to be the one, I feel, but for some reason that hasn't happened (couldn't he have stepped in yesterday, and told Dier and Walker and Mason how and where he wanted them to play?). And maybe there's a clue in that. Would he take charge of a situatiion if appointed?

So we ought to try to identify a proper potential captain/leader when next we shop around with cheque-book in hand. I can't see any other solution. And I can't really see a short-term fix before the summer. Let's hope we can get away with it till then.

 

I feel the same way about Vertonghen yesterday audrey - as the senior figure out of the back 4 and the two deeper midfielders he should have been bossing them around and sorting out the organisational issues on long balls well before half time. He's got a lot of experience of high level football, and leadership too, and for him not to have stepped up and organised his less experienced teammates is a black mark on his copy book. Your points about Lloris's leadership are interesting and I'm conflicted on the matter. On one hand he is clearly respected in the squad and in the division, and indeed recognised internationally as being one of the top goalkeepers around. He captains his country, and France are a top tier football nation so he must have some leadership qualities. He shouldn't have a problem bossing his players around but surely he could see from his position the problems that were repeatedly happening in our midfield and defence every time a United player hit Fellaini with a long ball? A player like Scott Parker didn't need the captain's armband to have a go at the players around him, pep them up and get them organised and neither should Vertonghen. I'm also baffled as to why Pochettino didn't have a word from the touchline during the first half and sort out a problem he clearly saw, because he sorted it at half time. Players like Kane can lead from the front by example and effort but he's not going to be able to organise and defensive midfield effort and a back 4 is he. Senior players in those areas need to have influence there during matches. Mason and Bentaleb seem pretty fiery characters and the type to do that, but maybe they don't have the nous to see what is wrong or the confidence to try and sort it out yet. I could just be overreacting to one bad game of course, but it is frustrating.

The captaincy issue in general is a debate worth having. I see the value in having a club captain as a figurehead and a spokesperson in a way for the playing staff, but really it shouldn't matter who wears the armband - every team needs leaders in all areas of the park and one of the issues with having such a young and inexperienced team at this level is that such figures often take time to emerge. The installation of Kaboul and Ade in official leadership positions in the squad at the start of Pochettino's tenure was surely an effort to get them onside and bring a sense of continuity during a season of big transition - unfortunately neither of those things happened. Lloris may be a good leader for France but the effect his leadership has on Spurs is less obvious. There appears to be no outstanding candidate for the Spurs captaincy and Lloris is the best of the rest unfortunately. It does make sense for him to have the position because if you're going to have a permanent captain then you need him to be playing all the games without that having a negative impact on the quality of the team - like the problem England have with Rooney right now for example. But real leaders don't need armbands for their leadership qualities to affect the game.

 

During the 90's I went to most home games, with one of the games being the home debut of Sol Campbell and I will use his name for this thread (instead of Judas) as for the qualities mentioned, Sol Campbell was an outstanding captain. A few games stick out, one of them was an away draw at the goons with Campbell showing the type of leadership, strength and passion that is missing as he would also show them qualities in relegation fights with teams such as Sheffield united or when when facing Man Utd.

We have had players who shared the same passion for the shirt (when playing) such as Ledley King, Sandro and Nacer Chadli, but they lack the qualities of a true leader as I would always see Campbell instructing the defence, shouting at full backs, he took it upon himself to be the guy at the back that the team depended on and yes Audrey, you're right, we don't have anyone like that in the team.

The squad has players that can scream at the camera when they score, grab the shirt after the game, that's great to see, passion for the outcome or a goal scored but during the game we have a lack of leadership and Pochettino must address this.

Although Pochettino will be lucky to be in a job this time next year but during the summer he has to identify a commanding presence that also offers quality to the team and looking at the current squad, that has to be a centre back or a defensive midfielder, although as the club signed Fazio for his physical presence and defensive qualities, I don't hold much hope for us signing the right player.

 

There appeared to be a lack of a motivator in the side yesterday. Heads dropped and then dropped further as goals went in.

But I don't think it was a game where a lack of organisation or instruction was the problem. Players knew what to do, but did it badly There were a number of individual errors which proved costly (similar to games against Chelsea and Liverpool earlier in the season - both 0-3 results). Walker and Rose are not good defensive full backs. They can contribute going forward, but I wouldn't want to rely on them defensively. Utd have a similiar problem (although it didn't arise yesterday) with Valencia's error v Arsenal in the F.A. Cup, the most recent example.

Your defence has kept one clean sheet away from home (3-0 at WBA). Kane and Eriksen have saved the day a number of times against some of the poorer teams, but it puts a lot of pressure on them knowing that at least two goals is needed to win a game - and when the opposition are good enough to take advantage of defensive frailties three or four goals are a minimum. No amount of good leadership can paper over such poor defending.

Join the queue to buy some decent defenders in the summer.

 

Nice to see you back, Boss.

I find it hard to blame Pochettino for his current choices of captain, as he's not really got a lot to pick from.
I think he went with consensus and seniority at first, then binned it when he found the choice completely inappropriate.
Lloris is just the best pick from a bad bunch, as far as leadership goes.

I think that it should definitely be a consideration when we go looking for centre-halves and central midfielders in the summer.
We lack organisation defensively and our youngsters could really do with someone to learn from, despite their obvious talents.
I can see potential in that role in later years for the likes of Dier, Bentaleb or Kane, but they're not there now.

 

Hi PNP I accept you can't blame Pochettino for the options he currently has, but we can blame Pochettino if certain areas aren't fixed (or attempts at least made) after the summer, as he has to work with the DOF (and scouts) and make it clear which areas need to be improved.

Although as Audrey mentions, the passing the armband around tells me Pochettino doesn't fully understand the best way to approach the choice of captain and he is still learning as a manager, he doesn't have the experience yet to cope with making all the correct decisions.

 

Poch certainly was looking to address the lack of leadership in the squad back in the summer:
Hector Moreno has captained the Mexico national team, but the deal was called off because he fractured a tibia at the World Cup
Mateo Musaccio has captained Villarreal several times this season, but the deal fell through due to third party issues grossly inflating the fee
Fazio was Sevilla's vice captain last season and was promoted to captain this season prior to our signing him

It looks poor when you look at the credentials of the current squad:
Lloris and Chiriches are captains of their respective countries
Soldado was Valencia captain
Capoue was France U21 captain
Dier was captain of Everton U18s the season he was on loan there

Of that list, Chiriches would have to be ruled out as other players are ahead of him in the pecking order, Soldado because giving damaged goods the captain's armband is not a good idea, Dier lacks experience, and the notion of giving a player as lazy as Capoue the armband is the sort of thing to keep fans awake at night.

There is the obvious elephant in the room that we did have a captain in the team when Poch arrived in the shape of Dawson, but while his leadership qualities cannot be denied the fears that his lack of pace would have caused us a lot of problems this season have been proven to have merit...by Fazio, who was #3 on Poch's list of centre backs in the summer.

We made a similar problem during The Baldini Splurge a couple of summers ago as we did during Comolli's Reign of Error: we brought in a bunch of young players who could all grow in stature and take the club to a new level a few years down the line, but we didn't bring in older, wiser heads they could learn from - but we saw plenty of them leave between 2012-13, such as Ledders, Parker, VDV, and Gallas.

 

If true, as I will have to take your word for it HBIC, but wanting to address an issue and knowing how to actually address the issue doesn't always go hand in hand and the chances are if we sign another foreign player (with one of the reasons being for his leadership) then he will be a failure like most of our signings and end up being dropped for his poor performances.

When rumours where being circulated that we where signing Fazio, Sevilla winning captain, there was excitement, most had never seen the guy play yet because he is foreign then the unknown creates a level of excitement, which lasted 5 minutes.

Still, the player we want may not be available so it may be a case of waiting but we have to make attempts to look for a leader, but more importantly someone who can lead in the British game as many of these names mentioned may be captain material abroad, yet over here they can't show such qualities.

 

I'd agree with what PNP said. There isn't one player we've got that I can think of as an obvious candidate. No one who sticks his hand up and stands out.

The problem is that the best leaders lead by example. The obvious future candidate,,based on that logic, would be Harry Kane.

 

I'll add something else to that: if we were looking to bring in someone who could lead, who would that be?

One candidate would be Ryan Shawcross: he's got plenty of Premier League experience, and he's captained Stoke for five years so certainly knows how to organise a back line, and at 27 he's got a few years in him while youngsters such as Dier mature - but he's contracted until 2018, so he'll cost a fair sum.

 

I mentioned Shawcross when Dier was getting praise for one decent performance against West Ham, although he followed it up with a few more before that little run came to an end but I would take players like Shawcross, Ashley Willians over a Fazio.

 

Boss, I see no one's picked you up on your joke reference to Chadli earlier.

 

I think we have a few potential future captains in the team right now. And a lot that have been captains before but now look nothing like leaders. Fazio, Chiriches and Vertonghen all previous captains of club and/or country but each one is error-prone. Surely they must have seemed dependable some time in the past.

Signing of the summer would be a loan move for Harry just for the summer. This squad and team is crying out for his sort of instant return signings of proven ability, confidence and bit of leadership.

Will we have to buy a captain?

And a goalkeeper simply cannot act effectively as a captain.

 

I agree with now suffering,Harry has leadership quailty's

 

We've lost quite a few leaders in recent years; Ledley, Parker and most recently Daws. It's hard to find players with the leadership quality but you do expect the more senior players to develop that sort of mentality and skill. Lloris and Jan are leaders in their own rights but don't compare to the previous three I mentioned, not sure why as they have the ability to be leaders, maybe it sounds silly but because they're not English (despite both speaking and understanding it well) it may hinder their communication to the squad?

Bossman you're back! Hope all is well mate.

I've said already about getting in a Prem proven CB. Chiriches and Fazio have been awful, Kaboul is no longer the CB he was prior to that long injury and it only leaves us with Jan and Dier. Vertonghen has been ok this season, better than last but nowhere near his debut year, whereas Dier has excelled beyond any of us could have imagined, I didn't really expect him to make an impact in his first season but he hasn't had too many bad games in a Spurs shirt, arguably been our best CB this season, which is a little worrying considering all our other CB's are full internationals. Someone like Shawcross, Williams (I also said Reid in January but his new deal pushes him out the picture now) and I'm sure there are other candidates we could look at with similar experience, should be one of our main priorities in the Summer.

 

A couple of years ago I was hoping we'd sign Jagielka, as he has several of the properties we need from a defender, plus he has leadership qualities. The only issue is that, while he has a couple of years left on his Everton contract which means he won't be as costly as Reid now will, he's 32 and you have to wonder if Levy will be so willing to bring him in if Everton demand a larger fee (especially if Moreno is apparently available for around £5.5m)

 

I wouldn't have Williams, I don't think he's really all that to be honest. Shawcross is an interesting option, I would worry that he was too similar to Dawson re. immobility and lack of skill on the ball but then again Fazio isn't all that on either of those fronts either and we bought him, albeit that he wasn't the player we were initially interested in. I don't know if the Stoke player might come with a reputation too, or indeed if he did that that would even be a bad thing. Hector Moreno I've never seen play apart from occasionally in international football so I don't really feel I can comment on him.

I don't have a problem with Hugo as captain, although I totally see what others say about GKs perhaps being less effective at organising players, except at defensive set pieces. Lloris can stay as captain as long as leaders step up to the plate in defence, midfield and attack. Our midfield and defence lacked coordination on Sunday for large parts of the game and players need to front up and sort that sort of thing out on the pitch, not wait for Pochettino to step in all the time because he did so too late on Sunday.

 

I know Ashley WIlliamas isn't a world beater but also someone like Reid is a good shout, mainly because of the fact they are proven premier league players and even when you look back to teams like Man Utd under Fergie, he had players such as John O'Shea who outside of Utd is on the level of Williams/Shawcross.

Or if you look back to when Redknapp took us to 4th, our best centre back that year was Bassong, while Crouch was more important to us then Berbatov ever was.

And jokes aside re Dier, he definitely has potential, wreckless at times with his tackles and would benefit from playing alongside a shouter, as Verts doesn't help him out with positioning and yes I agree about Verts and Lloris, they aren't actual leaders in this team. They should be as Lloris can be a shouter and confident while Verts is arrogant and should be taking it upon himself to lead but this is what happens when you have a multi national squad, you need proven British talent.

I would also look at Man City, they aren't right as a team, they lack leadership and even with their superstars, often they need James Milner to show drive, yet look around their team, they are lacking and one of the main reasons Chelsea are in a much better position is because they have a manager who understands the English game and has a proven English captain like Terry.

 

And talking of City, they won the league title with Lescott and Barry, who by the opinions of most fans are average players so thats another example of teams needing proven British talent, or names that aren't viewed as great talents.

 

You have to look at the team as a whole and how players fit together.

Clough had McGovern as his captain. He wasn't worth a place as a player alongside Shilton, Francis, Gemmill and the rest in a month of Sundays. But he saw him as the glue that held the whole thing together.