TOTTENHAM NEWS: Time to set a few things straight

By Gary Beaumon
April 22 2003

There has been some real lambasting of the team of late and to be honest most of it was justified. However the Internet gets littered with anti-Hoddle, anti-Spurs and anti-ENIC stuff, so it’s about time us Spurs fans took the smooth with the rough.

Although it hasn’t been a great season, it has been one that has been full of failed expectations. This possibly hardened the fall and made life even more unbearable than if we had lost in a cup final again (well perhaps not!). Isaac Newton would have made a good assessment of Spurs fans expectations…
…Not achieved Europe= Failure. (Although Newton was hardly the greatest philosopher the world has seen)
Well maybe we are not as big a failure as people or ourselves would like to make out. After some thought I believe that we may not be setting our stall out correctly in the first place.

First things first, in order to display my views I firstly have to justify Hoddle’s existence (Hard task ahead). Please skip this part if like me you are bored with the endless shall we keep him or shall we kick him views (Although reading some sites kicking would be rather human compared to what they would do to him).
Ok back to my piffle.
Hoddle has certainly made some rather large clangers this season and there is no denying that. Yet we find ourselves with more points than last season, more key injuries than last season and potentially a higher final league position than last season. As pointed out recently, last year was the first time in SEVEN YEARS we had finished in the top half of the table. There is a strong possibility we could do this again this season and surely that is a sign of marked improvements, especially considering we have not (or hardly at all) been in the lower half of the table this season.

There have been some bad decisions recently and some even worse results. In fact the result on Friday was a real kick in the teeth. Even losing the game was not the biggest problem, this (I’m sure I’m not alone in this) was the fact we showed no heart or enthusiasm. That for me is a very bitter pill to swallow, especially knowing Tom, Dick or Harry could gone out there and shown more enthusiasm in 2 minutes than that of the whole team. I will not put that down to a “one off” or a “bad day”, simply because it wasn’t a one off, we have had far too many of these performances this season and it has been an all too familiar story. So how is this defending Hoddle I hear you say?
Well after all this doom and gloom I still think things need to be assessed when we are all calm. If all decisions were made 20 mins after a game, then we would never have a manager and we certainly would run out of managers to choose from. There have been many people muttering we should replace the manager, in fact I think the majority of the Internet thinks this (although a recent poll I conducted strangely supported Hoddle). Yet I still do not think we should ask the manager to leave…just yet. Firstly there is always an uncertainty with changing the manager. If we lose one who hasn't done that badly and replace him with someone else, there is always that chance he would do well or on the other hand there is just as much chance he would do as badly or even worse as the last one. I wrote a response a little while ago, about the replacements that we could get. This didn't really amount to much, but the point I wanted to make was that if we want a manager with a proven track record of success, then perhaps we should bring in George Graham. Then I suddenly remembered he had already been here once before (trying to prove how fickle we are when it comes to performance stats). It is very easy to say Pleat, O’Neill, Moyes etc would work, but knowing if they would/wouldn’t bring success is simply impossible. We do not know if this would be the case and there is nothing to support the fact that any new manager would bring success. I am a person who likes to exhaust our options before jumping to decisions. By this I do not mean lets see if we get relegated, that’s absurd. If we were lingering down the bottom then I probably would jump onto the bandwagon and call for his head, balls and anything else that’s going cheap. I think whilst we are not going backwards or at least we show some signs of improvement (which we are) then we should try and keep faith. I certainly think we can use this summer as a marker on the following season. I also do not think Glenn should be given an easy ride, but we should try and air our grievances (by this I mean let the club know when we are not happy and when we are).

So, back to my original thoughts. I’ll recap (to save you scrolling back up the screen, especially if your trying to be coy whilst at work)…

…Well maybe we are not as big a failure as people or ourselves would like to make out. After some thought I believe that we may not be setting our stall out correctly in the first place.

By this I mean, is Europe such a big goal in the first place? There is defiantly a potential to uncover a pot of gold, or Euros as the case may be. However how did this pot of gold help Ipswich? How has it helped Leeds and Blackburn after recent charges? Not to mention the countless in-debt Italian, Scottish, Welsh and Irish teams (Who end up there every season) there is not a pot of gold, Europe is not a entrance to a new era. Europe is similar to that treadmill you get in gladiators; You get there, you fall and you fail, or you can get there, reach the top and you can succeed. It’s all about management.

What we need to be doing is making sure we have the right structure in the first place. We need to realise that entry into Europe is not a passport to spend millions. We need to provide a sound financial set up before going there, not to mention a team that can compete and at least reach the final of the Uefa of the second stage of the champion’s league. Even if we did get there this season, then it is almost certain we would not provide the necessary platform to grow. We are agonisingly close but we are not ready to take on Arsenal, Man U and Celtic just yet. So what should our aims be this season? You are probably thinking he wants us to finish and be happy we didn’t get into Europe. No I want to make sure we don’t run before we can walk. Our aims should be simple. Lets improve from last season, let’s build a squad capable of challenging for Europe and let’s sort out our injury crises. Ok perhaps we haven’t achieved any of these, but strides have been made. These are not all too apparent but we need to remember the positives from this season. Lets concentrate on this platform and ensure the summer is used to full effect. This summers going to be big, and a big test on the board and the manager but lets give them this chance and our full backing.