Article by e-Spurs Correspondent Nick BraceyAfter narrowly missing out on champion’s league football for the third year running, Spurs fans would have been forgiven for fearing the worst at the start of last summer, with Gareth Bale edging closer to the exit and a string of players at the club who were evidently not good enough to qualify for the champions league. Fast forward 3 months to August and Spurs fans may once again be forgiven for their optimism; £110 Million spent on seven new international players mostly with European experience led experts to class Tottenham as dark horses in the title race! The Levy project was complete, a young manager who shared the same vision as the club, an influx of promising European talent to ease fans pain at the loss of Gareth Bale, there was also a present there for Levy himself, the books balanced through shifting the previous seasons ‘dead wood’. However 32 lacklustre performances, one manager, three North London Derby defeats and numerous cricket score beatings from the top four later, it is evident that ‘the project’ has been a complete disaster for this season at least.
With the exception of Christian Eriksen (who is often wasted on left wing) the summer signings have been nothing short of woeful, overpriced players who simply do not seem to want to play for the badge. Erik Lamela has not appeared for months and in all honesty few of the other new arrivals namely, Paulinho and Roberto Soldado, might as well not have done with a string of below par performances their only involvement in a subdued campaign. This season the club seems to sum up everything that is wrong with the modern game, it appears that certain players would rather talk about leaving the club than roll up their sleeves and grind out a result. Jan Vertonghen is the one player who this applies to most, after an excellent first season at Spurs confirmed him as a fan favourite, his performances and attitude this season has been a disgrace.
Tim Sherwood has come in and done a respectable job, he’s taken over a team that had no identity and in his own words does not have the characters to challenge at the top. Although it seems increasingly likely that Sherwood will be the one to take the bullet at the end of season, as a fan it has been refreshing to see a manager who is willing to publically echo the thoughts of those who fill the terraces every week. He may not be Jose Mourinho tactically or have a strike partnership to score 50 goals for him, but one thing people cannot take away from Sherwood is his passion not only for the game, but for the club. If media reports are to be believed the highly experienced Louis Van Gaal will be taking control next season, a move that will hopefully ensure some quality signings in summer and a change in mentality of the current squad.
But the fact is that with 5 games left Tottenham have nothing to play for this season, they won’t catch the top four and they’re out of Europe. And with that the fans are left with little other than dreams of what could have been this season and the thought that next year just might be our year (again). With that there is little for fans to do other than turn their attention summer where they, like me, must be for a bit of stability at the Lane.
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Actually Eriksen on the left has been afforded much more space than through the middle. You only have to look at his crossing ability against Sunderland to see he's not exactly wasted there. And think positively, if we win at the weekend, we'll only be two points behind the Arse and they have potentially a tough game on Tues against West Ham after a huge battle against Wigan this weekend.
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ReplyDeleteWoe, woe and thrice woe! The end is nigh!
Change the record already. Fed up with fellow Spurs "fans" crying over a season that in all honesty really hasn't been all that bad. We're about where we expected to be before a ball was kicked.
Lost our star player, bought too many new players in 1 go and to wait for them to settle, changed managers and tactics mid season...I mean really what did you expect?
I was reading all the forums in the summer and everyone seemed happy and resigned to a 5th/6th place finish, so what changed? Getting tonked by Liverpool, City and Chelsea suddenly led the Spurs "faithful" to believe we were ready to challenge for top spot? Get real! We've had a couple of bad results and bad performances, no question, but we've been ticking along picking up points without ever really playing our out and out best. It's not been easy to watch at times but it really could have been so much worse so I don't know what you're moaning about. Next season will be a different story, lessons have been learned from this year and we can expect to see our settled squad perform a lot better next time out. For the love of God stop whining and attempt to be positive, your negativity is criminally boring and not welcome. COYS!!!