Red Faced Tottenham

Colchester sit 71 places below where Tottenham are with their respective leagues.  One can feel happy for the fans of Colchester to have something big to celebrate, a scalp that made the day for fans that could not believe that they had just knocked out the Champions League Runners-Up.  24th September 2019 has not been a good day for Tottenham fans.

So it is that underlying facade begins to get a little bit more exposed, as the tensions begin to ooze to the surface.  Pochettino's assessment that he currently has a unsettled squad hardly begins to tell the extent of the problems that hover around Tottenham, always threatening to engulf a football club that may have stretched and gone over their own means.

Having the mentality of a big club as opposed to buying the status of a big club are two different things.  Spurs are caught in a horrible bind.  The players coming to the end of their contracts are being told by their agents that the strategy of doing nothing will not only frustrate the negotiation stance of Tottenham but lead to a free transfer and a higher return on the next contract. 

The only reason one should call themselves a "Big Club" is by winning in big ways - Spurs have threatened to do something big but they have either faltered or surrendered title winning opportunities.  The good news after the penalty shoot out loss is that the rot was not evident in their game against Arsenal, if anything Arsenal had a strange game on that day, and they had a strange game against Aston Villa also - yet showed great character to be red carded and losing 2-1, and then score a couple of goals in quick succession to turn defeat into victory.

Spurs had a moment under Pochettino where they were very tuned into performances, but the Pochettino training regiment and his ability to drive the max potential out of each player thus hide the reality that when the bubble burst at Espanyol using the same strategy - Pochettino was sacked because Espanyol ended up in a relegation spot in La Liga.

How fickle fans are that over the last week since the Leicester City loss, more fans of Tottenham have been talking about sacking Mauricio Pochettino.  This is a manager Manchester United were willing to pay Spurs 50 million pounds compensation for to get him out of his long term deal with Tottenham.  Real Madrid can come calling at anytime with Zidane needing turn around his results or face a quick exit from Real Madrid, despite the fact that Zidane led Real Madrid to three Champions league victories. 

There are actually calls for Jose Mourinho to be installed as Spurs manager, but then how does a manager like Mourinho cope with a tough negotiator like Daniel Levy.    It is not just the reality that as many as three Spurs players could leave the club for free.  Fernando Llorente already did and now Napoli are experiencing benefits of bringing him on as a substitute.

There is no crystal ball available to know if Spurs can turn their season around, it becomes a guessing game if they can be any better than in prior years, especially when the players know the extent and scale of the problem  Losing against lower tier like Colchester United is a severe red faced moment.