Mauricio Pochettino - Sacked

[Mumorn]

 

[Robspur12]

United were there for the taking 5 points in the last 6 games!
As soon as we lost to United the squad give up.
If we had beat Burnley away and Villa at home and got a draw against Stoke away we would have been 4th.

How do you know that Utd would not have found another gear if they were forced to? Once they had secured 4th tbh they took their foot off the pedal. Finishing 5th is an excellent achievement given the money spent in the summer by the 4 teams ahead of us and a manager in his first season. Btw lovely to finish ahead of Brendon "if you spend 100 million you should be challenging for the league" Rodgers. Think he will go tbh, especially with the sterling row gaining momentum. Oh karma is a wonderful thing Brendon.

 

[glorygloryeze]

Great first PL finish by Poch; whilst i didn't like the way we 'Spurs things up' post the Manure, a cup final lost against the eventual champions plus finishing the 'best outside the top 4' and esp ahead Brenton, is not to be sniffed at.

Now that Poch has proved worthy, please PLEASE Levy can you back him. Ta.

COYS

 

[stinkfoot]

Now that Poch has proved worthy, please PLEASE Levy can you back him. Ta.

COYS

Word.

 

[Modric THFC]

How do you know that Utd would not have found another gear if they were forced to? Once they had secured 4th tbh they took their foot off the pedal. Finishing 5th is an excellent achievement given the money spent in the summer by the 4 teams ahead of us and a manager in his first season. Btw lovely to finish ahead of Brendon "if you spend 100 million you should be challenging for the league" Rodgers. Think he will go tbh, especially with the sterling row gaining momentum. Oh karma is a wonderful thing Brendon.

So its acceptable to give up at the end of the season when you are a few points behind?
Two weeks ago Bayern needed to score 3 goals in the last 15 minutes against Barcelona. They kept running til the end when most other teams would have just lay down. That shows the different in mentality of the team used to winning and us.

 

[thfcsteff]

So its acceptable to give up at the end of the season when you are a few points behind?
Two weeks ago Bayern needed to score 3 goals in the last 15 minutes against Barcelona. They kept running til the end when most other teams would have just lay down. That shows the different in mentality of the team used to winning and us.

It is UNACCEPTABLE. THAT is why Poch will have some new people in next season, in the areas he knows we often play 75%ers...

 

[Robspur12]

So its acceptable to give up at the end of the season when you are a few points behind?
Two weeks ago Bayern needed to score 3 goals in the last 15 minutes against Barcelona. They kept running til the end when most other teams would have just lay down. That shows the different in mentality of the team used to winning and us.

I don't think the team gave up. More they simply ran out of steam. Blimey and it's a bit of a stretch to compare ThFc to Bayern.

 

[braineclipse]

So its acceptable to give up at the end of the season when you are a few points behind?
Two weeks ago Bayern needed to score 3 goals in the last 15 minutes against Barcelona. They kept running til the end when most other teams would have just lay down. That shows the different in mentality of the team used to winning and us.

It's not acceptable to give up, no one has claimed that it is...

But you're essentially saying that if we had played consistently at our best in the final 3rd of the season or thereabouts we would have finished higher. The facts are that all the teams we compare ourselves to have been inconsistent, including those with a transfer and wage budget much larger than ours.

Our inconsistency this season is not surprising, and is acceptable.

 

[Jimmy-g]

I thought Bentaleb was fantastic at FB yesterday, I get the impression with Bentaleb that if there was a problem with injuries he would say " I will play there boss".

 

[parklane1]

It's not one result, 5th is the outcome from our combined performance over 38 games.

Excately, there were a few Spurs fans who thought we would fail this season and have been proved wrong. Its early days but I have seen enough this season to suggest that Poch is on the right track.

 

[Hashegotthesackyet?]

It's all relative. Yep, we have messed up certain games.
But so have all the other teams, that have all these much better managers than us... as the table proves.

Rogers, Martinez et al...

 

[Hemant]

It's not acceptable to give up, no one has claimed that it is...

But you're essentially saying that if we had played consistently at our best in the final 3rd of the season or thereabouts we would have finished higher. The facts are that all the teams we compare ourselves to have been inconsistent, including those with a transfer and wage budget much larger than ours.

Our inconsistency this season is not surprising, and is acceptable.

In my view what we saw against Burnley, Manure was not inconsistency but capitulation: not getting in a decent couple of efforts says this. You may say that is inconsistency but the evidence is in the videos of the games.
Either we eradicate that mentality or we suffer and accept mediocrity, Poch needs to change that, whatever the cause is.

 

[glorygloryeze]

It's important that Poch remembers the form we've mainly had from the Manure game.
A nice-looking 5th place finish can easily paper over what was capitulation in some games. Whatever the reason it is his job to identify and take steps to limit/eradicate it next season.
On one hand this 5th place feels very Jol-esque (a nice high finish after the pressure of actually challenging for top 4 had gone/we'd bottled the challenge) but on the other hand it also feels like the first Jol 5th place and AVB's 5th place when most of the season we were realistically punching above our weight.
I know people may mention Harry's 5th place in 2011 but that was a serious poor slide where we missed a great opportunity to cement 4th place imo (both on and off the field).

Anyway, onwards and upwards and here's hoping Poch (and the board) doesn't sit on his/their laurels this summer. A LOT of work still to be done.
Looking forward to the summer regardless, and i can only thank the way the last two weekends of fixtures have gone for that.

COYS

 

[braineclipse]

In my view what we saw against Burnley, Manure was not inconsistency but capitulation: not getting in a decent couple of efforts says this. You may say that is inconsistency but the evidence is in the videos of the games.
Either we eradicate that mentality or we suffer and accept mediocrity, Poch needs to change that, whatever the cause is.

I don't understand at all why those games can't be accurately described as inconsistency. Several, if not all, of the 3 teams immediately ahead of us have had similar problems.

I agree that a attitude change is necessary. I think Poch has been well aware of that and is working on it. Take the end of this season as an example. The doom-sayers were predicting us to not win another game, perhaps finish in 8th place etc. The players had "obviously given up" etc... The players though hadn't given up or stopped playing, fought back and put in two good performances in the last two games of the season.

Perfectly described as inconsistent to me. And good signs that the mentality is improving.

 

[Spurmac1974]

As well as how successful we are in trying to buy the right players, the most important thing this summer and next season is how this group of young players mature. A full pre season as part of the team not just the squad will make a big difference to them. If you look at Kane physically from when he first came into the team he just seems to have grown, saw a seasons review video somewhere and he looks so different now(grown man)to how he looked the night he went in nets(young boy)

 

[Modric THFC]

I don't understand at all why those games can't be accurately described as inconsistency. Several, if not all, of the 3 teams immediately ahead of us have had similar problems.

I agree that a attitude change is necessary. I think Poch has been well aware of that and is working on it. Take the end of this season as an example. The doom-sayers were predicting us to not win another game, perhaps finish in 8th place etc. The players had "obviously given up" etc... The players though hadn't given up or stopped playing, fought back and put in two good performances in the last two games of the season.

Perfectly described as inconsistent to me. And good signs that the mentality is improving.

The only reason they woke up against Hull was someone told them they were doing a lap of the pitch at the end of the game.

 

[glorygloryeze]

The only reason they woke up against Hull was someone told them they were doing a lap of the pitch at the end of the game.

Lol. At least we know you're trolling now

 

[Jurgen the German]

Overall thoughts on the season and Poch:

Good

• Fewer points than last season, but a higher league position. Of course, points are an indicator of progression/regression, but ultimately the league position is more important in my opinion.
• Props to Poch for maximising Kane's potential.
• Style of play is still not great, but slowly improving.
• We look like scoring more than we did under previous managers.

Bad

• Defensively we look like we have gotten worse as the season has gone on, with slight improvements over the last two games. Can't see us finishing 5th or higher next time around if we do not improve in this area as Liverpool and Soton are not going to stand still. Must improve in this area. Getting rid of Chiriches will only help. Still not convinced about Fazio either.
• Some of his subs and team selections leave a lot to be desired. I'll put it down to him being relatively inexperienced.
• Home form needs to be improved. Too many poor results against the lesser sides.

Overall, a very satisfying season. I think it's been quite a weak Premier League so whilst 5th is a really good achievement for a first season, we will no doubt need to improve to achieve the same again or better. This means Levy backing him in the transfer window. We need at least two defenders, a dominant centre midfielder and a backup for Kane.

 

[Raziel]

Using Jurgen's format

Good

- League finish and cup final, 5 out of last 6 seasons above Pool, important to keep that going
- Kane, Bentaleb, Rose, Dier (consider Eriksen/Hugo as known quality prior)
- Finally reversed the very disturbing recent seasons of being hammered by everyone in top 4
- The feeling/connection, moments in this season felt almost as feel good as the BMJ days, something we have struggled with due to a series of divisive managers

Bad
- not sold on level of cover provided by current setup of inverted wingers and Mason/Bentaleb pivot (see GA as proof)
- Squad depth is poor, CB cover weak, RW/LW cover, no striker other than Kane, options needed for DM and cover for Eriksen
- Inconsistency, part of it due to finding best 11, too many young/inexperienced players
- Deadwood, Ade/Kaboul/Capoue need to go, cannot be helping squad
- Lennon, can't see how it benefitted us to not use him and instead let he help save Everton's season.

Happy sign off of season, window will be critical, we can't afford another window of misses. Poch also needs to be a little more self critical and learn the value of flexibility at key points in season.

 

[Modric THFC]

Lol. At least we know you're trolling now

But seriously if you look at the effort we put in the game at the end of the season (not results) we tried in a few of the bigger games to the players Southampton and City. The lesser the opponent the less work the players felt they needed to do.

There was no inconsistency at the end of the season. There was a consistency of effort proportional to how important the players felt the game was.