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OT: What next for Harry?

I get that. But my argument is that we got to that position with the players we had. Why did we suddenly collapse? Surely that wasn't because of NOT buying a striker?
We had enough lead on the Arse to get through. We failed.

We had a problem scoring goals during that collapse.

1-0 loss to QPR

1-0 loss to Everton

1-1 draw with Villa, had plenty of shots on goal but couldn't score

Frustating draw at home to Wolves
 
We lost modric, vdv and king in 1 window, had that happened under redknapp he'd have got similar funds to spend.

But as I said before, we were in a title race in January and only needed 1 or 2 players to keep Arsenal at bay IMO. Why not go for it when we had our best league position in January for decades?
 
It's not so much that Levy vetoed Harry, but I've been critical of his failure to get deals done/dragging them out. Remy is another we are perinnally linked with, but never get.

I'm not so much interested in net spend. But overall, we spent close to £50m in this window, we spent £5m in the whole of last season!! And that season we got some tidy sums for Crouch and Palacios plus the money from Hutton and Keane, close to £30m we recouped.

We bought Pienaar in the previous Jan window, again, no striker!

I'm annoyed about the striker situation as well! Fustrating!. My point was that Levy is at least being consistent - he only spent 50M this last window because like in 2008 we had the money to. Plus we had some big holes in the squad to fill - like in 2008.
 
We had a problem scoring goals during that collapse.

1-0 loss to QPR

1-0 loss to Everton

1-1 draw with Villa, had plenty of shots on goal but couldn't score

Frustating draw at home to Wolves


Agreed, but I still say it was the same group of players who got us within striking distance of 1st place BEFORE the slump.

Arsenal were 10 points behind us even WITH RVP playing his bollox off.
 
Lost at home to norwich, with redknapp Saying that the wrong side was picked (can't play without a holding mid), yet somehow absolving himself of the blame!

I actually thick redknapp was fantastic for us, he really was, but he lost the plot when the England Job came up.
 
I'm annoyed about the striker situation as well! Fustrating!. My point was that Levy is at least being consistent - he only spent 50M this last window because like in 2008 we had the money to. Plus we had some big holes in the squad to fill - like in 2008.

Agreed, but we did have some considerable CL revenue money, but then again, that could have gone into the stadium fund.
 
Lost at home to norwich, with redknapp Saying that the wrong side was picked (can't play without a holding mid), yet somehow absolving himself of the blame!

I actually thick redknapp was fantastic for us, he really was, but he lost the plot when the England Job came up.

Yeah I remember that: "you can't play 4-4-2, you know.." it was bizarre and I think sadly he really was feeling the pressure.
 
Agreed, but I still say it was the same group of players who got us within striking distance of 1st place BEFORE the slump.

Arsenal were 10 points behind us even WITH RVP playing his bollox off.

Look, I'm not saying Redknapp didn't make some big fudge ups, because he did.

Playing Bale and Modric out of position.

Subbing VDV against Villa and bringing Parker on.

Being too negative away from home.

But I'm still frustrated that we didn't strengthen in the last two January windows despite being in a great position in the league on both occasions.
 
Remy is another target he wanted. I'm not a big fan of his, but Redknapp obviously thought he would improve us.

I do wonder about that really. We went really really cold this summer on him (you could say, AVB then decided he didn't want him) but I just wonder if we really wanted him that bady. The Marseilles Chairman tried to say we had made a bid and were in talks in the last window but Spurs made a point of publically denying that was the case. Semed odd that one.

And also seemed odd that Redknapp seemed to telegraph to the world that he was on his way to the Lyon-Lille match to watch him. That seemed bizzare: would any other manager actually telegraph that??? Also, didn't Redknapp say he went to scout manay forwards in France before that time and said 'none of them are any better than Pav'? What was that about??

Also remember being linked with Rodallega.
To be honest, I do wonder actually who Redknapp had earmarked to sign, apart from Tevez (who he said he would have 'loved to have signed'), which of course there was fat chance of. TBH I wonder if he really earmatked anayone - apart from Rodallega...
 
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I think we did the same under Jol in the lasagne gate season, Could have done with a striker in jan when we were 4th in the league but only managed to tie up berbatov for the end of the season.

Levy goes for the financial deal at the end of the day, the only time he's spent big in jan was ironically when he gave redknapp 40m.
 
I do wonder about that really. We went really really cold this summer on him (you could say, AVB then decided he didn't want him) but I just wonder if we really wanted him that bady. The Marseilles Chairman tried to say we had made a bid and were in talks in the last window but Spurs made a point of publically denying that was the case. Semed odd that one.

And also seemed odd that Redknapp seemed to telegraph to the world that he was on his way to the Lyon-Lille match to watch him. That seemed bizzare: would any other manager actually telegraph that??? Also, didn't Redknapp say he went to scout manay forwards in France before that time and said 'none of them are any better than Pav'? What was that about.

Also remember being linked with Rodallega.
To be honest, I do wonder actually who Redknapp had earmarked to sign, apart Tevez, which of course there was fat chance of. I wonder if he really earmatked anayone - apart from Rodallega...

Two seasons ago was even worse mate. How many times did we batter teams (Blackpool, West Ham) but couldn't score? I just can't believe that Redknapp wouldn't have wanted another striker after the stinkers that Crouch, Pav and Defoe served up that season.
 
Look, I'm not saying Redknapp didn't make some big fudge ups, because he did.

Playing Bale and Modric out of position.

Subbing VDV against Villa and bringing Parker on.

Being too negative away from home.

But I'm still frustrated that we didn't strengthen in the last two January windows despite being in a great position in the league on both occasions.

To be brutally honest I think this was partly down to Levy/board and partly down to Redknapp. I don't want to seem offensive but I honestly don't know if he had the clout/confidence/know-how/experience to buy players at the level where you are making further tweas to a good squad to make it great. TBF to him we were his biggest job he'd ever had and purchasing players at our level of need but with our budgetary restrictions I think he would have found difficult. I think his targets were often PL tried and tested and any subtle targets beyond that (which often I felt we needed - see Saudi Sportswashing Machine) I think he struggled to brifge that gap.

That's why apart from Remy (odd) and Damiao (ongoing) we cannot name other strikers that we were linked with - part from Rodallega (see PL tried and tested) and perhaps the board trusted his judement less and less as time went on (Palacios, Crouch, Pienaar etc). And hence transfer stalemate - and old crock Louis Saha
 
I get that. But my argument is that we got to that position with the players we had. Why did we suddenly collapse? Surely that wasn't because of NOT buying a striker?
We had enough lead on the Arse to get through. We failed.

It's because our squad wasn't strong enough. Our first XI last season was as good as anyone's in the league except City's, but over a 38 game season it's a squad game. Now it's partly Harry's fault for not rotating enough in the first half of the season, but come the second half of the season we didn't have any alternatives when our players were burnt out. Successful seasonal management is making sure that different players hit form at different times because nobody can perform at their peak for an entire season. In the 09/10 season we got lucky, because we had Defoe, Lennon and Kranjcar in brick hot form in the first half of the season, then when injuries/fatigue set in for those guys we had Modric coming back from injury for the second half of the season as well as Bale emerging as a left-winger and even Pavlyuchenko who had hardly played in the first half of the season started to produce the goods. Last season we had our entire first XI in form in the first half of the season as they tinkled on everybody, but fatigue set in and we had nobody else to come in, whereas our rivals had fresh players to keep their seasons going.

At the end of the day, if you'd asked a neutral where they would have expected Spurs to finish with our squad each season under Redknapp, they'd have probably said:

08/09: Avoid relegation (considering where we were when he started) - we came 8th which was our 4th highest ever PL finish
09/10: 7th/8th - We came 4th
10/11: 5th/6th - We came 5th. But nobody thought we'd beat Inter and AC Milan to reach the CL quarter-finals, so we did surpass expectations that season
11/12: 5th/6th - We came 4th

I think the squad over performed every year he was here. Yes, we were miles ahead at one point and collapsed, but as I said before, we didn't have the squad depth to maintain a run like that.

Oh, and I can't believe anyone who says Ramos was a greater success than Redknapp. Yes, he won a trophy, but the football was generally brick under him whereas it was generally good under Redknapp. Ramos beat Arsenal and Chelsea to win the cup, but Redknapp also beat Arsenal and Chelsea within a few days of each other on his way to CL qualification. It just so happened that the two games Ramos did it in meant that we ended up with a trophy, you could even argue that the two games Redknapp won were for far higher stakes for the opposition so perhaps they're a bigger achievement.

Let me remind you - Ramos had a worse points per game record than David Pleat's caretaker role in the 03/04 season. Yes, that season where the likes of Gary Doherty, Helder Postiga, Anthony Gardner and Kasey Keller were first choice players. His points per game record was also worse than Graham, Hoddle, Gross, Francis...in fact every single one of our managers except Ossie Ardiles (and technically AVB too but it's too early to count him). Whereas Harry produced the BEST POINTS PER GAME RECORD OUT OF EVERY MANAGER WE'VE EVER HAD. Now if that's not a categorical success, I don't know what is.
 
It's because our squad wasn't strong enough. Our first XI last season was as good as anyone's in the league except City's, but over a 38 game season it's a squad game. Now it's partly Harry's fault for not rotating enough in the first half of the season, but come the second half of the season we didn't have any alternatives when our players were burnt out. Successful seasonal management is making sure that different players hit form at different times because nobody can perform at their peak for an entire season. In the 09/10 season we got lucky, because we had Defoe, Lennon and Kranjcar in brick hot form in the first half of the season, then when injuries/fatigue set in for those guys we had Modric coming back from injury for the second half of the season as well as Bale emerging as a left-winger and even Pavlyuchenko who had hardly played in the first half of the season started to produce the goods. Last season we had our entire first XI in form in the first half of the season as they tinkled on everybody, but fatigue set in and we had nobody else to come in, whereas our rivals had fresh players to keep their seasons going.

At the end of the day, if you'd asked a neutral where they would have expected Spurs to finish with our squad each season under Redknapp, they'd have probably said:

08/09: Avoid relegation (considering where we were when he started) - we came 8th which was our 4th highest ever PL finish
09/10: 7th/8th - We came 4th
10/11: 5th/6th - We came 5th. But nobody thought we'd beat Inter and AC Milan to reach the CL quarter-finals, so we did surpass expectations that season
11/12: 5th/6th - We came 4th

I think the squad over performed every year he was here. Yes, we were miles ahead at one point and collapsed, but as I said before, we didn't have the squad depth to maintain a run like that.

Oh, and I can't believe anyone who says Ramos was a greater success than Redknapp. Yes, he won a trophy, but the football was generally brick under him whereas it was generally good under Redknapp. Ramos beat Arsenal and Chelsea to win the cup, but Redknapp also beat Arsenal and Chelsea within a few days of each other on his way to CL qualification. It just so happened that the two games Ramos did it in meant that we ended up with a trophy, you could even argue that the two games Redknapp won were for far higher stakes for the opposition so perhaps they're a bigger achievement.

Let me remind you - Ramos had a worse points per game record than David Pleat's caretaker role in the 03/04 season. Yes, that season where the likes of Gary Doherty, Helder Postiga, Anthony Gardner and Kasey Keller were first choice players. His points per game record was also worse than Graham, Hoddle, Gross, Francis...in fact every single one of our managers except Ossie Ardiles (and technically AVB too but it's too early to count him). Whereas Harry produced the BEST POINTS PER GAME RECORD OUT OF EVERY MANAGER WE'VE EVER HAD. Now if that's not a categorical success, I don't know what is.

Yep, we surprised everybody when we finished 4th in 09/10

Don't think anyone had us finishing above Chelsea last season either
 
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