@D.G.C. genuine question then - and I'm trying to engage with you on this in good faith because you've been on the board for a while, meaning you're either a seriously long running sock account or the only member of what hbic would call 'the lunatic fringe' we really have on here - who would you like to manage Spurs if we sacked Poch tomorrow, and who would you try and buy, realistically, if we got say £150m for Kane in the summer? I want to know what you think the alternative is beyond selling one of the best, if not the best striker in the world and sacking a manager who could walk into pretty much any job in the world if he became available. I'm genuinely curious what you want this team to look like and who you want to manage it.
I,myself,cannot answer that Question. I want Spurs to win the PL (and everything else!) but,who ever is the manager since Bill's 60/61 season,including Bill himself,have managed collectively,with the players,continually keep shooting themselves in the foot for one reason or another. Will we ever be champions? God knows.Not in our lifetimes perhaps. Someone at New White Hart Lane needs to sit down and figure out why!
Conte and let's see who's coming up in the academy. Son and Llorente have proved that they can do a job in Kane's absence. There must be a lot of lunatics because others agree with me about Kane and his return has disrupted the play. Bad results at the wrong time.
No but seriously I want to know what is seen as the viable alternative is at this moment in time. People disagree about a lot on this board but my perception is that nearly all of us agree that Poch, with all his flaws, is the man to keep taking us forward and that Kane is a crucial part of that. I would love to see an alternative proposed that I would find convincing. I agree with all of that and I (and others) have posted quite a few times on here recently about needing to add players to the squad who aren't just the required level of footballer, but also the kind of characters who drag teams over that final hurdle. We have 90% of what is needed but that last ingredient is still missing and I'm not sure we can develop it in-house. Of course I desperately want us to win the league, hell, win anything. The league is perhaps more likely to happen again in my lifetime than others as I think I'm probably one of the, if not the youngest poster on our board, so I have many decades of Spurs-induced suffering yet to endure. But the only thing I really have a memory of us winning is our last League Cup, so I'd take any trophy for starters!
Conte is a very good coach. My main concern would be that he, I believe, criticised Juventus when he left them about a lack of funding for transfers. Would he even want the Spurs job given our budget? Maybe it's a matter of managing expectations but we've done that poorly with Poch I think these last few years, so I would be concerned about a frosty relationship with Levy if he even entertained taking the job in the first place. Plus he didn't handle Chelsea well, though they're a notorious group of players for that. Conte is the kind of coach that I would look at IF, 3-5 years down the line once we're in the new stadium, Poch is still with us and hasn't won anything. The reason that I think Poch is the best man for this job right now is because I can't see another manager of his calibre doing a better job with the hand he has been dealt, partly because Poch is a very good coach despite his flaws, and partly because managers of his calibre have a lot of other options before Spurs when it comes to taking roles at clubs who can spend the money they feel they need to shape the squad they want. I don't think it's fair to pin the last two results on Kane. Burnley was down to a collective lack of sharpness, including from Sonny, after a break, and poor setting up of the team by Poch. As far as the Chelsea game goes, I stand by my earlier comments on this thread that we didn't perform at a level too far below Chelsea, we just lacked the sharpness to convert the half-chances we created. We lost that game because Toby and Lloris made errors and Pedro is still a very good player. I find it hard to blame Poch and Kane for that. Sonny has looked well off the pace the last two games and I don't think his performances can be put down to Kane, they don't get in each others' way like Kane and Janssen would, for example. They're a good pairing up top for precisely that reason. As far as the academy goes I can't agree on that at all, academy players are nearly impossible to predict as it is, Kane being the perfect example of this. If you'd seriously gamble on selling Kane and only trying to replace him from the academy then I'd like the lottery numbers while you're at it. To get a player of his calibre come through the academy is a once in a generation happening, if that.
I do agree that Kane's return has disrupted the team but i wouldn't sell him. The correct course of action would have been to continue with Son upfront, given the way he was playing and the results we were getting. I would have then started Kane from the bench, bringing him on if necessary or for the last x minutes if we were comfortably ahead. That way he would have been slowly brought back up to match fitness. FFS, even Llorente was beginning to pick up some form and confidence. Momentum thrown away, just like it was last season.
So we’re at Poch and Kane out now. Cool. Anyone thinking Trippier captain and new 6 year deal on £200k?
DGC might be as mad as a box of Frogs but he/she has a point. Kane returning disrupted us. Kane returning disrupted Son That does not equate to let's sell Kane. Listen up people but...bigger teams than us bench top players from time to time. Aguero at City...all depends on the dynamics of the team in the situation. You say how does he get match fit without matches? Throw him on with 20 to go. Conte did us in the FA Cup semi by benching Costa and Hazard...they came on and screwed us. If Kane can't see why he's on the bench after an absence then he needs to grow up and if he can't perform off the bench then he's got a lot to learn...better more successful players than him have come off the bench to show their worth. None of this says sell him or get rid of Poch but questions can be asked and football will always be a team game.
