Switching Off

The Southampton defeat should make Spurs manager Mauricio Pochettino angry.  He will know that to compensate for the recent losses earlier today at Southampton and at Burnley a few weeks ago, Spurs now need to get results away at Manchester City and Liverpool, or hope that two of Arsenal, Manchester United and Chelsea go into a slump.  Things would have been much worse had Chelsea come back from behind to pip Wolves today in their 1-1 draw, and Spurs could have done with a draw between Arsenal and Manchester United.  As it is if Chelsea win their game in hand, then both Arsenal and Chelsea will be sitting 1 point behind Tottenham in the race for the two remaining Champions League spots.

No one is contemplating that Liverpool and Manchester City have a disastrous last eight games, even if both do have to play Tottenham on the way.   That leaves four teams chasing two Champions League spots. 

For the second time this year, Mauricio Pochettino was unusually forthright in his criticism.  His blow up with referee Mike Dean a couple of weeks ago earned him a touchline ban for two games.  That should feel unjust considering Pochettino's exemplary record as a manager for presenting a totally professional face.  Yet in the damning criticism of the team after the game today, Pochettino looked more unhinged than a manager sending a harsh message to his players.

The best way to send a harsh message to the players is in private, away from the prying and story seeking tentacles of sports media.  His rant today was not simply a damning criticism, but he articulated the words that this team do not have the mental strength to win trophies.  Only several weeks ago he was saying that only ego's speak about winning trophies, so it is clear that his personal frustration is boiling over. 

While he is considered a leading contender for the jobs at Real Madrid and Manchester United, his frustration is compounded that Real Madrid are in the kind of bad shape that makes it a managerial risk to take over what is a damaged but not sinking ship in Spain.  He was heavily touted to be drawn to Manchester United but the amazing success of Ole Gunnar Soljaer has shown that the "Manchester United Way" is still alive and kicking.   That Pochettino deploys his methods which are more similar to Leeds United manager Marcelo Biesa than they are to the legendary United manager Alex Ferguson, means that it is he who presently would represent a risk as a Manchester United managerial pick.  Biesla is the first Leeds manager in decades to be on the cusp of returning Leeds United to the big-time. 

Biesla expects all out physical and mental commitment the same way Pochettino does, but that is not a surprise because it is Biesla who has been the great mentor to a younger Pochettino as he was beginning to learn the managerial ropes. Pochettino's rant today is a far cry from Spurs superb victory over Borrussia Dortmund last Wednesday.  If the Spurs players were not physically up to the Southampton game, simply watching how Dortmund pressed them and forced the Spurs team into a rear-guard action, shows why they looked fatigued in the second half.

Yes, Tottenham did switch off badly in the second half, but this fatigue can be extrapolated to the effort it took to reach the Quarter-Finals of the Champions League.  Rather than speak of Spurs not having the mentality to win trophies and thus reinforce a common belief in the football world, he could have expressed his disappointment but framed the critique in a way that energizes the team, rather than potentially demotivate them.  After all, after the International Break, the next league game for Spurs is that trip away to Liverpool. 

If Liverpool beat Spurs in that game, it will be after Liverpool face Bayern Munich away in the remaining Round of 16 Champions league games.  If Liverpool are not fatigued in that game by playing Tottenham off the park, then what is the real root cause for the fatigue exhibited in the game against Southampton today?

Perhaps the arrogance that Pochettino is talking off, is a belief that Spurs players may hold that they are "good enough" to win the Champions League.  Instead of battling out eight league games, maybe they think that they have it in them to win the three games it will take to win the Champions League.   Yet those three games are played twice, once at home and once away.  That means to qualify for the Champions League by winning it, they more or less have to fight and win the same number of games it will take to qualify for the Champions league with a fourth place finish.

Maybe the very words that Pochettino used today, may lead to even greater levels of fatigue that end up with this team not having any champions league football whatsoever.  At least with the news that they may play their first game in their new stadium next month and having Champions League football finally return back to their home base, may be a motivator, but that motivation was stripped off its potency, by a public dressing down of the squad.

Pochettino is neither a controversial manager like Jose Mourinho, or a showboating manager like Antonio Conte, so his comments will not make him lose the respect of the dressing room, the way Chelsea players turned against Mourinho and then Conte - but Mourinho and Conte had already secured the Premier League Title in the season before with Chelsea.  If there is a criticism of Spurs players not having what it takes, it may simply be Pochettino projecting upon his players his own fear.   That would explain just how out of character these latest two outbursts have been, in what is and remains to be one of the most likeable football managers in the Premier League, if not in global football.

Pochettino should have given due credit to Southampton's fighting spirit and maybe couched his words by challenging his players to maintain that same spirit.   The truth is that Tottenham have succeeded this year because Tottenham have shown some very uncharacteristic fighting spirit.  To beat Borussia Dortmund 4-0 on aggregate with two wins demonstrates the team has shown that.  It must be frustrating for Pochettino to be considered for the Manchester United job, when it is entirely possible that a rookie manager and former United legend may end up winning an FA Cup, finish above Tottenham in the league and gain kudos for his remarkable triumph in overcoming a 0-2 first leg loss to beat PSG ladened with star-power 3-1 away in Paris.  That makes United the first ever team in Champions League history to overcome a first leg 2-0 home loss.

He has to learn over the next month to both take the heat in the Premier League kitchen and give Spurs plays the added belief that they can defy all odds and win the Champions League.  It may end up that his squad of players may need to make up this leadership deficit that has been revealed in these last two surprising outbursts from Pochettino.   As much as Pochettino has done to turn Tottenham into a Premier League contender, he has to learn to fight the demons that halt him from becoming a perennial winner.  Both Real Madrid and Manchester United are horrible places to try to prove that, because both of these soccer institutions are merciless in the face of failure.  For sure they would be willing to give a manager like Pochettino time, because he has proved that should be counted among the best managers in the world. Yet his education is not complete until he (like Maurizo Sarri of Chelsea) prove that they can win the big competitions. 

Normally a great manager is psychologically seeding the opposition teams with pressure and trying to distract them off their game plan.  Sir Alex Ferguson and Jose Mourinho both were brilliant at psyching out other teams, though Mourinho ended up psyching himself out at both his final stint at Chelsea and the failed move to accommodate Manchester United.

A win in their next game against Liverpool on 31st March will relieve some pressure, but only if the other Top 4 seekers begin to slip up.  If they keep winning, the pressure will be constant.  The silver lining is the switch back to the new White Hart Lane (new stadium) which may give a psychological boost to their run in, but with the next Tottenham game a full 21 days away, it is puzzling why Pochettino launches his damning criticism of his own team at the press conference after the Southampton game.  If anything, it proves that old adage that "Words have power" and maybe today, that lesson will dawn on Mauricio Pochettino - as he frames games that get Tottenham through the "Champions" mindset they need to develop.