AVB had huge success when finishing 5th. I think it was the highest total to not get Champions League Football (though i'd need to check that). Villas-Boas was an outstanding coach and arguably better than Pochettino tactically. An astute manager who helped turn Bale into the star he is today. He moved him to the number 10 position in Feb of that year and altered the team around him. Obviously, Bale was entering another level but AVB totally bought into that. At the end of that season AVB was about as secure a coach as there was in the league. Approaches from Spain and PSG followed. He was sacked six months later. What happened?
Obviously, the departure of Bale was massive and the spending of the money is always the headline for his departure. In reality, that wasn't as big of a role in his departure. While AVB is a great coach his major weakness is his man management issues, as seen in his time with Chelsea and Spurs. When you look back at why things unravelled so quickly its quite laughable. The issue that started his demise was......Hugo Lloris. When Lloris was signed, Brad Friedel was playing really well and he didn't drop him immediately. AVB didn't care for the pressure he was being put under by the media and started acting out. It was a complete non story but AVB started to lose it. Ridiculous really. Then when Lloris did play, he received a head injury and carried on playing, which fed into a recent narrative on concussions. Again AVB started acting out, this time against the club, claiming the club worked against him with the Lloris injury.
The following week we played West Ham and lost. We were really poor that day and AVB decided to call out the players. In fairness, they probably deserved it, but in the space of two weeks he had now had arguments with the players, the media and ownership. It was an extraordinary turn around. Could it get any worse? Yes. Two weeks later Spurs played Hull and fans, typical for Spurs, started booing at half time. AVB then had a dig at the fans. On the day of that game (end of October) Tottenham's record was 5 wins 1 draw and 2 losses. They had only really had one poor result, against West Ham, yet AVB now had pissed off the fans, ownership, media AND the players! We were 4th in the league, 3 points off the lead. At this stage the whole club was against him and he was a couple of mistakes from losing his job. He lost three of the next 7. Not terrible but two of those losses where by six at City and five at home to Liverpool. He was fired on the 16th December with the club in 7th.
The Bale money is always the headline, and is another debate I like to have, but in the case of AVB it had nowt to do with his departure. An inability to pick his battles and manage his own ego was what cost him in the end. He managed to go from a beloved figure to someone on the outs within three weeks. It was one of the most incredible things i've seen at the club and i've seen a LOT in my time.
Thought the only issue was whether we had Ron for 1 year or more. I am recovering fast though and what doesn't kill us makes us stronger 
