The pace of change

Six years ago, on another site (possibly 606) I posted my selection of our best XI and the reserve line-up. Of those 22 players, the only one still remaining with the club is Aaron Lennon. (Not all of the other 21 have been bought by clubs managed by Steve Bruce or Harry Redknapp, by the way! )

I find this a little depressing to be honest. We're not the best at choosing, appointing, and keeping our managers. But we also seem to be pretty bad at either gaining the loyalty of our players, or showing them much loyalty in return. I know it's the way things are these days. But I'm just feeling a bit of nostalgia for the idea of a settled team who remain with Spurs through thick and thin. And I'm old enough to remember when that happened. I really hope some of our youth team graduates (Mason, Bentaleb, Kane, et al) decide that they'll stay with us and resist the temptation to chase the dollars elsewhere. Wouldn't that be grand? Like Ledley, like Stevie Perryman........ well, you get the drift.

A gentle rant from a grumpy old git?

 

This doesn't rhyme!

I agree with you to some extent Audrey and I think that our lack of management stability hasn't helped us to maintain a stable squad.
The other major factor is our rather dodgy position, not quite challenging, but constantly trying to.
This results in us shedding those that aren't deemed good enough, while also having those at the top of their game picked off.
We've also lost a few players to strange circumstances, like King, Woodgate or van der Vaart.

Good point about our youth products. You'd hope that they'd show a little more loyalty and be given a little more time, too.
It'd be nice to see the likes of Pritchard and Carroll being given a shot next season.

 

Read somewhere that Poch would rather promote from within than splashing the cash to appease the masses.
I was talking to some mates the other day about our youth set up, why bother having it and totally ignoring it as other managers have done recently.

 

I was hoping you wouldn't notice.

 

I think it's the same for every club now. Players are turned over at an alarming rate. But if you look at the two most successful clubs of the '90s and '00s, you'll see that both Utd and Arsenal had a nucleus of players who were there for 5-10 years and racked up 250+ appearances. That tells us a lot - continuity is key to success.

 

I'm pretty sure that close to the same would be true for most other clubs. It seems to be because managers think they can tell the difference between players of similar skill levels when they ought to concentrate on coaching and building a team

 

King - 1999 - 2012
Defoe - 2004 - 2014 (1 year sabbatical)
Lennon - 2005
Dawson - 2005 - 2014
Huddlestone - 2005 - 2013
Jenas - 2005 - 2013
Assou-Ekotto - 2006 - 2014 (let's be honest)

Not sure I agree with you on this Audrey. In the majority of cases the reason we have had to get rid is because we (and indeed the whole league) have gone up a level since these players joined the club. I'd argue the above longevity is pretty good for players who were mostly good, but never exceptional for our club (bar King who had no choice but to retire).

Another point to consider is that most of the above are Arnesen/Commolli signings - they were bought very young intentionally, so they have been able to spend their whole careers with us. When we moved into the Redknapp era, which arguably we are probably only just coming to the true end of in terms of our playing staff, there was a definite switch to purchasing older players who were finished products.

These two eras have coincided so that the players who were bought young in 2004/5, and the players who were bought old in 2009/10, all reached the age of 30 at roughly the same time - the age when players are generally deemed to start to decline. The result is that the last couple of years we have had to go for practically an entire squad refresh, and our current squad are all relative newbies.

 

We don't want a host of players growing old together though which I've been told has happened before. But I do agree with you that the pace of change has been far too quick.

 

I'm someone that highly respects loyalty, so I'd be happy to see a group of players play alongside one another for as long as possible (especially as I think that's a key component in having a successful side) although that's a distant dream these days as players mainly play for the money and instant trophies rather than more traditional values of loyalty and working towards being a successful side but I always feel that here at Spurs, we usually have a little nucleus of players that will stick around longer than most.

Hudd, Daws, Lennon, Ekotto, Defoe, Jenas and most importantly Ledley were all part of a little group we had for a good number of years, unfortunately only Lennon remains (Benny in wilderness so won't include) but we still had a good number of years with that group of players and enjoyed watching them for the most part.

Now I'd like to think that the likes of Kane, Mason, Townsend, Bentaleb, Walker, Rose (even if still not Rose's biggest fan, he's had a decent season so far and fought for his place which I like to see) will all still be here for a few good seasons more. These guys are relatively young so the scope for improvement is huge, genuinely believe that they could help contribute towards something special.

 

audrey the closing window suggests Spurs management agree with your proposition that a settled squad/team is the best option at the present time. Especially after the recent experience of signing loads of players at one time following the Bale windfall

 

Which is definitely the right policy,especially with many young players in the squad.