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Thomas Frank - Head Coach

Raziel said:
Ange's first year was markedly better than his 2nd in league, and that's part of what people need to evaluate with Frank.

Ange, Jose, Conte all had better first years than 2nd, so there is actually no evidence it will get better.
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Conversely, Poch, BMJ and Harry all had better second seasons than first. A good manager can take time to implement their ideas. Especially if they have to compete in Europe as well as domestically in their first season.
 
Gutter Boy said:
None of those players were those players in 2014.

Simons, Gray, Bergvall, Odobert, Moore, Lankshear etc may be being talked about in the same way in 2038 (about their 2029-32 peak) if they follow similar trajectories under the right guidance.
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GB, I love your posts and I absolutely adored Poch. But I do cringe when you use him to undermine managers you don't like. In many ways it poisons his legacy. If the time is right he will come back AtM though I really think TF needs to be supported.
 
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Robspur12 said:
Conversely, Poch, BMJ and Harry all had better second seasons than first. A good manager can take time to implement their ideas. Especially if they have to compete in Europe as well as domestically in their first season.
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It's not really a good yardstick to measure on. Managers who struggle tend to get sacked after about a year (especially here) - there's no evidence available to say what would happen if they were to be given time because they invariably do not get given it.
 
Robspur12 said:
Conversely, Poch, BMJ and Harry all had better second seasons than first. A good manager can take time to implement their ideas. Especially if they have to compete in Europe as well as domestically in their first season.
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So did AVB, game for game he had more points than the season before, and a 100% record in Europe.
 
Robspur12 said:
GB, I love your posts and I absolutely adored Poch. But I do cringe when you use him to undermine managers you don't like. In many ways it poisons his legacy. If the time is right he will come back AtM though I really think TF needs to be supported.
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Do you not think everyone should be held to his standards though? Especially considering that all five of his successors have had considerable more resources made available to them that he ever had (he did everything on zero net spend remember)?

I just don't see that it can be that hard to find a decent manager of his ilk (if not him). I'd be keen to see Iraola given a shot for that reason, maybe Xavi. But just a decent human being, who can inspire players and fans, play attractive possession football with a bit of edge, and be tactically competent. It's not too much to ask is it (although 4, possibly 5, flops in a row suggests otherwise)?
 
Gutter Boy said:
Do you not think everyone should be held to his standards though? Especially considering that all five of his successors have had considerable more resources made available to them that he ever had (he did everything on zero net spend remember)?

I just don't see that it can be that hard to find a decent manager of his ilk (if not him). I'd be keen to see Iraola given a shot for that reason, maybe Xavi. But just a decent human being, who can inspire players and fans, play attractive possession football with a bit of edge, and be tactically competent. It's not too much to ask is it (although 4, possibly 5, flops in a row suggests otherwise)?
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So to separate the conversation

- Ange got us 5th and a trophy (so while had to go, hard to classify as a flop), Conte got us back to CL, Jose got us a cup final. I'd argue only Nuno and now possibly Frank are a flop.

Which is interesting, because while they didn't match the highs of Poch, they kept the club in range, still in the mix. The decision not to fire Ange meant we never even tried to correct last season and the main concern is we are doing the exact same thing with Frank, i.e. not even trying to correct course to get us to at least a European spot.

- Re the decent person, I said somewhere else, Spurs does best when the vibes/feeling around the club is good, motivator managers seem to fit us best.

My thought is there should be some principles of what we are looking for in a manager and f that brings us a name no one here has heard of, it shouldn't matter (no one ever heard of Maresca and Arteta managed no one, similar with Pep originally at Barca)
- The club needs to determine what our basic style is to keep player acquisition coherent (3atb? wingers? technical/possession?)
- The manager should have both a style of play (some system) plus some adaptability, plus a willingness to work with youth -> Udogie, Gray, Bergvall, Sarr, Vuscovic, Moore, Odobert, Williams- Barnett, some of these need to make it.
- That style/system has to be inclined to dominate games at least against the lesser teams
- The manager needs some kind of charisma, ability to deal with press.

The idea that there is no manager out there that could do a job is OTT
 
Gutter Boy said:
Do you not think everyone should be held to his standards though? Especially considering that all five of his successors have had considerable more resources made available to them that he ever had (he did everything on zero net spend remember)?

I just don't see that it can be that hard to find a decent manager of his ilk (if not him). I'd be keen to see Iraola given a shot for that reason, maybe Xavi. But just a decent human being, who can inspire players and fans, play attractive possession football with a bit of edge, and be tactically competent. It's not too much to ask is it (although 4, possibly 5, flops in a row suggests otherwise)?
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I don't.

He had the best squad in the clubs history.

He managed them brilliantly (for a time), and deserves a huge slice of the credit, but he didn't make wine out of water.
 
Baleforce said:
I don't.

He had the best squad in the clubs history.

He managed them brilliantly (for a time), and deserves a huge slice of the credit, but he didn't make wine out of water.
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He did. Lloris was heading out the door because everything was so crap. Fazio was our starting centre back. Rose was neck-a-neck with Zeki Fryers to replace BAE at LB. Capoue and Paulinho (or Stambouli) was our starting central midfield. Chadli our main wing forward. Kane was Lankshear plus 1 year. Vertoghen, Eriksen and especially Dembele were around but still underwhelming. We were a real mess in 2014.
 
thfcsteff said:
Seeing as we’re back at Ange v Frank again (LOL), I think it is worth pointing out that Ange came into a bigger mess with bigger needs. No Kane (and not really knowing it until deadline day), undoing the Conte/Stellini mess of the previous season, moving away from mid-level bloated squad players into a new direction; that was a lot of work. Frank himself came in saying ‘we stand on the shoulders of others’ and spoke loudly about ‘building on the foundations Ange built’, yet here we are and it’s apparently now going to take a long time to and people need to know there’s no ‘quick fix’, we’re apparently ‘not really a CL club’, and so on and so forth.
It’s two messages.
The only thing I can conclude is that despite all the homework Frank will have done, he simply did not understand what he was stepping into.
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Ange came into.......sorry what? Frank came into finishing 17th, record number of defeats of any team not to be relegated, most good players in the squad with long term injury issues and the whole top of the club ripped out after 20 years.....
 
SissokoWasGood (BoL) said:
I think the difference with Palace was that we actually raised our level in possession in specific moments of the match to the point it felt like we were all over them and were more likely to get the next goal. The strategy seemed similar (although I did feel we had some good moments in possession quite early in the game at the Gtech…not sure if by design or just the players saw the openings and went for it, there was a lovely one touch move out of defence through the middle quite early on, think it ultimately ended with Gray’s attempted curler) but the quality in possession against Brentford was extremely lacking for the most part.

And it was simple passes from players that easily have the quality to do better. Porro was guilty of this even. We’d have a chance to break. And actually it seemed like the team wanted to, rather than horsehoeing it back. But it was like they were out of sync. The run and the pass would be in a different direction.

That’s what really disappointed me about yesterday. I can actually completely get on board with Frank’s project if we see more performances like Palace. I think it’s a good example of what he wants to achieve, and I’ll take true defensive solidity and effective countering in a tough away game. But yesterday was simply not good. The players were bad in possession, when they absolutely had more quality to do better. And I don’t know whether it was an off day, whether Andrews knew too much about Frank and so cancelled him out, or whether the players felt rushed and over eager to do something because they didn’t have much of the ball, and therefore the decision making suffered.
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One of the differences between Palace and Brentford was that the Palace game was one of those rare games (when in Europe) that our opposition had a quick turnaround between games and we didn't. I think the biggest difference between the two games was how good the opposition was on the day.

Palace and the home game against Brentford (who were poor on the day IIRC) our only two wins in our last 10 league games. And for me at least not any clear games in that run where we deserved more than we got.
 
Looking at the form table for last 10 games, it ain't pretty.

Premier League Form Table

The 2025-2026 Premier League Form Table showing a mini table of the latest football results for every team in the division
thefishy.co.uk thefishy.co.uk

Spurs 17th, only better than the mighty Iraola at Bournemouth (so much for that schmuck!) and our very own Scott Parker at Burnley and Rob Edwards at Wolves.

Fulham are 4th, Silva of course!

Maresca is available, if he isn't wedded to City?

Emery at Villa would have been very good for us.
 
This is a good post, from the transfer thread:



Silly McSilly Face said:
So you want to sack a manager who took over a team that finished 17th and broke a record for losing the most games without getting relegated, because he's 12th at the midpoint, 4 points off 5th, having been without his firat choice striker and two most creative AMs for the entire season because...."the eye test" .......as i've said on here before the "line of sight" to how things get better is that Solanke, Kulu, Udogie and Maddison return and the football improves almost by default. Additionally our home form only needs to improve to just reasonable mean levels to start putting more points per game on the board in the 2nd half of the season.

I have reservations about frank being the answer but getting rid at this stage in the circs would be ridiculous.
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As a halfway measure, id move now to get Michael Carrick in as Matt Wells' replacement. Freshen up the coaching with someone who is a bit more au fait with passing and possession
 
Raziel said:
So to separate the conversation

- Ange got us 5th and a trophy (so while had to go, hard to classify as a flop), Conte got us back to CL, Jose got us a cup final. I'd argue only Nuno and now possibly Frank are a flop.

Which is interesting, because while they didn't match the highs of Poch, they kept the club in range, still in the mix. The decision not to fire Ange meant we never even tried to correct last season and the main concern is we are doing the exact same thing with Frank, i.e. not even trying to correct course to get us to at least a European spot.

- Re the decent person, I said somewhere else, Spurs does best when the vibes/feeling around the club is good, motivator managers seem to fit us best.

My thought is there should be some principles of what we are looking for in a manager and f that brings us a name no one here has heard of, it shouldn't matter (no one ever heard of Maresca and Arteta managed no one, similar with Pep originally at Barca)
- The club needs to determine what our basic style is to keep player acquisition coherent (3atb? wingers? technical/possession?)
- The manager should have both a style of play (some system) plus some adaptability, plus a willingness to work with youth -> Udogie, Gray, Bergvall, Sarr, Vuscovic, Moore, Odobert, Williams- Barnett, some of these need to make it.
- That style/system has to be inclined to dominate games at least against the lesser teams
- The manager needs some kind of charisma, ability to deal with press.

The idea that there is no manager out there that could do a job is OTT
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Agree with all except the basic style and formation for player acquisition. Players (as well as managers) should be bought based on a winning mentality. Proven at a lower level, and see if they can step up. People with something to prove, and a track record of doing whatever it takes to get the job done. Styles and formations change too much for a one style squad of players fits several managers. Technically good and mentally strong should be the principles. Within that there is always scope for any manager to get a few of 'their' players, without messing with the overall squad.
 
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