Transitional seasons

[90sSpursBook]

It seems that every year is a transitional season at Spurs. Id define a transitional year as one where the manager changes during the season or in the pre-season or if a major player whom you build your team around leaves you and/or you have mass new signings to try and imbed in. That means that since the Pl has started the following have been:

92/93: Shreeve replaced by Livermore/Clem in Pre-season; Lineker left. Sheringham, Barmby, Anderton, Ruddock all introduced to 1st team.
93/94: Livermore/Clem replaced by Ardiles. Ruddock left, Sheringham injured majority of season.
94/95: Ardiles replaced by Francis mid season; Klinsmann, Dumitrescu, Popescu introduced to 1st team.
95/96: Klinsmann, Barmby, Popescu all left; Armstrong took 11 games to score but team fairly settled as season progressed.
96/97: Sheringham, Anderton and Armstrong missed large parts through injury. Should have progressed from decent season beforehand but went backwards:
97/98: Francis replaced by Gross mid season; Sheringham sold in Summer. Ginola and Ferdinand come in.
98/99: Gross replaced by Graham. Pleat introduced as DoF.
99/00: Probably a rare season we weren't in transition; we were largely crap but not in transition.
00/01: Graham replaced by Hoddle after ENIC buy club in Dec. Ditto 99/00 for most of it. Ginola sold pre-season. Rebrov joined.
01/02: Glenn's first full season; Campbell left in Summer.
02/03: little transition; season started well but went very flat by xmas.
03/04: Hoddle replaced by Pleat in Sept. Season a complete mess after.
04/05: The most transitional season ever. Arnesen, Santini and Jol plus a virtual new squad. Santini replaced by Jol in Nov. Season ended well with optimism for following year.
05/06: Arnesen does the dirty on us in Summer eventually replaced by Commolli. Otherwise a promising season with Carrick, King, Dawson, Robinson and Keane starring.
06/07: Carrick sold to Man Utd and not replaced like for like. Berbatov and Keane formed great strike partnership and we finished 5th second season in a row.
07/08: Huge outlay on Bent, Kaboul, Bale; slow start to season and Jol sacked during a game! replaced by Ramos - 3 major January signings and the Carling Cup success.
08/09: Worst Summer ever! Berba and Keane leave; Bentley and Pav come in and Ramos sacked in Oct to be replaced by Harry. DofF system dismantled. Keane and Defoe back; emergence of settled team.
09/10: Harry's first full season see CL qualification and FA Cup SF. Squad was strengthened without being turned upside down.
10/11: Not transitional - our one and only CL season which included VDV; faded towards end settling for 5th. Good season.
11/12: Again not really transitional for a change; we held firm on Modric. Were in title race until Jan but ran out of steam.
12/13: All 3 years of virtual peace and quiet Harry sacked and replaced by his polar opposite AVB. Modric and VDV sold. DoF system reintroduced with Baldini.
13/14: Bale sold on eve of tfr window and 7 new players brought in with not a mins experience of PL. AVB sacked and replaced by Sherwood in Dec.

So, that's 12 times in 22 years that we have changed manager either before or during a season and 9 occasions where our most important player from the previous season (Lineker, Kilinsmann/Barmby, Sheringham, Ginola, Campbell, Carrick, Berba/Keane, Modric/VDV, Bale).

This is why where we are where we are and not higher whilst Arsenal have had the same manager for 17 seasons - yes they've had unrest when their key players have been sold (Vieria, Henry, Fabregas, Nasri ,RVP etc) but everything else remains the same.

Whilst we (ENIC) continue to operate like a circus with revolving doors their will be a glass ceiling we will never break through.

 

[AdamB]

Part of the reason we have had so many transitional seasons is that we've had some real quality players but not been able to get into the top 4 regularly. Therefore the teams above us want our players which weakens us and we start again.

The other obvious reason is that Levy's track record at picking managers has been woeful (Gross, Graham, AVB, now Sherwood....)

 

[Jurgen the German]

First of all great post. I think most of us know we're a club permanently in transition but when you list it like that it really does make grim reading

One thing I will say about Arsenal, they got lucky in the sense that Wenger turned out to be a big gamble that paid off handsomely so there really has been no reason for them to get rid of him. But let's just say ENIC ran Arsenal, would he have lasted this long? I doubt it personally.

I still think our biggest mistake was sacking Redknapp. Granted two successive nightmare second halves of the season were poor and missing out on the CL in 11/12 when it seemed like a slam dunk in February was gutting, I didn't want him sacked but at the time I felt like he almost got what he deserved. But we never backed him in either of those two January transfer windows when we were crying out for a striker. 12 months another window rolls around (this time with AVB) and its is the same ******** as before, we don't sign a striker and Defoe gets injured with 25 minutes of the following game. We never ****ing learn.

 

[lurker of old]

I still think our biggest mistake was sacking Redknapp.

Hindsight is such a wonderful thing. At the time I was majorly ****ed off with HR for taking his eye off the ball, many of us were, but - with hindsight - maybe he deserved another season.
Ah well!

 

[billyiddo]

i just think it's the double edged sword which comes with being 'best of the rest' - arguably you could say we have done well over the recent years managing the situation - if you look at say the 10 seasons prior to when we first got the 5th place positions with Jol and who were the clubs which were close to breaking the top 4 - Everton, Villa, Saudi Sportswashing Machine ... whoever else - did any of them keep it up for as long as we have? Everton seemed to go from contending one to dropping down the table the next, Villa the same and Saudi Sportswashing Machine suffered relegation not long after being close to getting themselves in to the top 4.

you're that close to being among the best in the country that your team isn't far behind - so that means your best players will be targeted by those above (or from abroad) as they know you haven't got the money to compete.

Re Redknapp - i don't think we'd have fared any better had he stayed if i am honest - possibly fair to say we would have played better football in the season and a half since but we'd still have had a rebuilding project to under take had he stayed - Modric would still have left and if Bale had played to a similar standard he also would have been off.

 

[Jurgen the German]

i just think it's the double edged sword which comes with being 'best of the rest' - arguably you could say we have done well over the recent years managing the situation - if you look at say the 10 seasons prior to when we first got the 5th place positions with Jol and who were the clubs which were close to breaking the top 4 - Everton, Villa, Saudi Sportswashing Machine ... whoever else - did any of them keep it up for as long as we have? Everton seemed to go from contending one to dropping down the table the next, Villa the same and Saudi Sportswashing Machine suffered relegation not long after being close to getting themselves in to the top 4.

you're that close to being among the best in the country that your team isn't far behind - so that means your best players will be targetted by those above (or from abroad) as they know you haven't got the money to compete.

I try to look at this way, it could be a hell of a lot worse. We support a team that's been in and around the top 5 for the last 7/8 years, won a trophy and gone mightily close to winning various others with the added bonus of CL football and the chance to visit some of the world's greatest stadiums. We could be following a non league side or a team that gets mismanaged financially whilst we are powerless to stop it.

 

[billyiddo]

I try to look at this way, it could be a hell of a lot worse. We support a team that's been in and around the top 5 for the last 7/8 years, won a trophy and gone mightily close to winning various others with the added bonus of CL football and the chance to visit some of the world's greatest stadiums. We could be following a non league side or a team that gets mismanaged financially whilst we are powerless to stop it.

the added bonus is that with continually being there or thereabouts people get itchy feet and ask why aren't we doing more - Im generally very pleased with what we do as a club although it has to be said it's by no means perfect. i have quite openly been critical when we didn't do as well as i though we should have, mainly in Redknapps last season as i genuinely thought we had scrimped and saved and worked ourselves in to a position where we had a golden opportunity to get ourselves right up there with the league leaders - those types of opportunities are possibly going to be hard to come by so it's imperative that we make the most of it when it comes around - because as we saw with what followed our players won't wait around too long should we not achieve what we should, meaning huge set backs/having to start over.

 

[rosenthal]

The other obvious reason is that Levy's track record at picking managers has been woeful (Gross, Graham, AVB, now Sherwood....)

Gross was pre Levy and ENIC, Graham was sacked by them but not appointed.
You always take a calculated risk when you select a manager, people with good track record might be the wrong fit for our club while unknowns might have a breakthrough with us. The only manager selection that was blatantly the wrong decision under ENIC was Santini. Only chosen for his name and status, not speaking english, not wanted by the Director of Football. Some / most of the others didn't deliver good enough but that's an hindsight Levy didn't have at the moment of their appointment. So I don't think he has done that poorly when he select his new managers, perhaps it should be questioned whether Levy should show more loyalty in periodes when manager and team are on the low .. however look at Jol's trackrecord after us and he's seldom managed to turn things around when they've gone bad, and they always seem to do after a year or two. Ramos would have gotten us relegated. Hoddle was under heavy fan pressure.

Hoddle - exciting , crowd pleasing appointment. Could have delivered if we had the same financial strenght as we do these days.
Santini - failure
Jol - excellent appointment, kickstarted the current era of Spurs as a top 5 club.
Ramos - biggest upcoming name at the time, had won UEFA twice in a row. Delivered a trophy. Cultural and language issues?
Redknapp - excellent appointment
AVB - again one of the most exciting upcoming names of his time
Sherwood - just a short term solution so far

 

[metalgear]

i think a greater examination at ENIC is due. to be fair in recent times the average duration of a manager's job has also rapidly declined. even so if just going club to club, my instinct tells me that we have the higher manager and player turnover in recent times.... which makes THFC a plaything for Levy.

 

[Jurgen the German]

We could do with letting Levy deal with the money side of things and bringing someone in to oversee the football side cos Levy hasn't got much of a clue about football.

 

[braineclipse]

i think a greater examination at ENIC is due. to be fair in recent times the average duration of a manager's job has also rapidly declined. even so if just going club to club, my instinct tells me that we have the higher manager and player turnover in recent times.... which makes THFC a plaything for Levy.

Would you mind explaining how you get from a high manager and player turnover to the club being a plaything for the chairman? I really don't see the logic there.

We could do with letting Levy deal with the money side of things and bringing someone in to oversee the football side cos Levy hasn't got much of a clue about football.

Isn't that the general idea with the DoF/technical director?

 

[Jurgen the German]

Would you mind explaining how you get from a high manager and player turnover to the club being a plaything for the chairman? I really don't see the logic there.



Isn't that the general idea with the DoF/technical director?

Yeah but Levy still hires and fires managers doesn't he? His track record isn't that good.

 

[Raziel]

So where is stat man?

- what you need to do is put a results chart next to your timeline, because for the last decade the club has been pretty consistent
- the fact is, by good luck or bad, without the emergence of City, Spurs would be a top 4 club, not sure how/who we blame for that.

Can think of a few pretty big clubs with worse turnovers than us.

In my opinion, Spurs can make 6th/7th in the EPL with a donkey in charge, the quality of the manager really only shifts the needle a couple of places. Money has ****ed the game so badly over that basically the bottom 10 teams are in "survival mode" top 8, 6, 4 are pretty much set, just some variation in order year over year.

 

[braineclipse]

Yeah but Levy still hires and fires managers doesn't he? His track record isn't that good.

Based on our Levy's previous history when we've had a DoF in place (assuming Baldini's technical director role is essentially the DoF role with a different name) I would think it's overwhelmingly likely that Baldini will at least have a very strong say in any decision like that. Arnesen got Jol as soon as Santini was out the door (Santini was hired before Arnesen iirc), Comolli obviously got Ramos.

I don't know of any club with a good track record when it comes to hiring managers (plural). Not any club our size anyway.

 

[Craig_J]

I really can't be bothered but I'm sure if I was to go with Chelsea they've had a fair few transitional seasons and have kept going succesfullly

I think money is the key point We can't buy microwave success so we have to go step by step slowly trying to piece together the ingredients.

If we ever string together two Champions League finishes I think our luck will pick up sharply

 

[Raziel]

I really can't be bothered but I'm sure if I was to go with Chelsea they've had a fair few transitional seasons and have kept going succesfullly

I think money is the key point We can't buy microwave success so we have to go step by step slowly trying to piece together the ingredients.

If we ever string together two Champions League finishes I think our luck will pick up sharply

I agree, the more money you have, the less you need to give a **** about manager quality/consistency, see Cheat$ki/Real/etc.

 

[Craig_J]

I agree, the more money you have, the less you need to give a **** about manager quality/consistency, see Cheat$ki/Real/etc.

And of course the more likely you are to keep a 'unhappy' player happy with a new contract

 

[metalgear]

Would you mind explaining how you get from a high manager and player turnover to the club being a plaything for the chairman? I really don't see the logic there.

levy's role is to steady the ship: constantly changing the management team and crew undermines stability which in turns stalls long term growth, and prevents optimization of resources.

 

[Mosquito_Coasting]

I don't think Levy can stop fiddling now. I know AVB said he wanted Baldini but even that felt like a fiddle, there wasn't too much wrong last season.

 

[Mr_B]

you could say every team has a transitional season if theyre not champions, can you stand still and be transitional like the scum have in not winning a trophy for x number of years