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We blew it!

Jurgen the German said:
Let me put it this way, Arsenal did a better job of replacing the players they lost. Rather than congratulating them, shouldn't we look at ourselves a bit and ask why we didn't adequately replace the players we lost?
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I'm not sure that they did, Cazorla was a good signing, the rest I'm less sure about. I think that we had a bigger job to do in the summer than them and all of our summer signings have done well with the exception of Adebayor. I think that more importantly, we built a solid base for the team last summer, a couple of quality signings this summer and we will be significantly better.
 
We should be absolutely gutted. But many people on here consider that we have had a great season and much has gone well. But I believe we are in significant trouble and the reason lies at Mr Levy's door. Gaining Champions League football may have convinced Bale to stay, may have convinced a couple of squad changing players to sign. In the close season we can expect Arsenal to spend up to £70m on strengthening their squad and much as I hate Arsene he can spot good players. Emirates Marketing Project will splash the cash and Chelsea, with Jose back in the fold, will do likewise. Liverpool are improving and we can expect them to press us for fifth. Mr Levy will continue to look for young talent at good prices - sometimes it works - Vertonghen and Sandro are great examples - sometimes it doesn't but essentially we (he) is trying to get Champions League football on the cheap.
For the sake of an extra £15K on a forward and/or £15K on an attacking midfielder we could have got the extra two points (or goals) that would have got us fourth position. But Mr Levy will always, always try to get by with spending less than he needs to. I could recall many occasions when he has starved the team of players in key positions - this season he left us with Defoe and Adebayor upfront - and one of them had a crisis in form. That is a bad decision on his part and contributes towards the loss of tens of millions in Champions League income and may contribute towards us not keeping Bale.
This is penny wise and pound foolish - trying to get into the Champions league on the cheap and the Gooners are laughing at us - again!
In this day and age the only teams who can compete are those with massive funds available - preferably from gate receipts but often through a sugar daddy. It is time for Enic to sell up to an owner who will inject that extra £50M that can mean us consistently qualifying for the Champions League - and more than that - competing to win it, not being delighted just to take part. When I started supporting Spurs in the early sixties we were competitive at the highest level - I want to see that again before I meet my maker and I won't while Enic are in charge - it is just a fact of life in today's football world.
Applaud a good season if you will but the power at the top of the Premier league remains the same.
 
Jurgen the German said:
Well at the very least, that win should have given the squad a lift, we went on to lose 3 of the next 4 games. I think our defeat at their place last season was the turning point, to lose so heavily must have been disheartening for our players. So we actually beat them at a similat stage, and yet the outcome is still the same in the end :(
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And only two of those were in the league. We lost twice in 23 games I believe and got a record points total. Yes we can say that we should have signed someone, we shouldnt have dropped certain points but everything in perspective - If you go on the run like we have since losing to Everton in December and still don't quite manage to get top 4 then it is really just unfortunate that two other teams managed to do something similar and squeeze a couple more points out than we did.
 
Neymar said:
totally agree. and i would also add, i think vdv is overrated by many spurs fans. the simple fact is, we were able to get him for a relatively affordable fee because better clubs didnt think he was that good. and then we sold him to hamburg for a similar fee; that says it all.

he was a player who was technically very good. but in some sense had to be carried, and have the team fit around him. for all his benefits, he probably wasnt worth keeping for us considering the levels we are trying to reach.
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I couldn't disagree with this post any more. If we had kept VDV instead of buying Dempsey say, we would be 4th or 3rd this season. I firmly believe that. Mind you if either of Ade or Defoe had any extended run of form we would have skipped past Arsenal this year too. That is my one regret that we did not strengthen our strike force in January.
 
Jurgen the German said:
Can I put this question to the forum?

Do people not think that goals/expectations change as the season goes on? I remember when we drew at Highbury in 2006. A story emerged that the players were told in the dressing room that we had qualified for Europe, no one celebrated as the players were desperate to get the 4th spot. Now I don't think many people would have tipped us for 4th at the beginning of that season either.

We had a 7 point lead in March and a psychological advantage over Arsenal as we had just beaten them. I seem to remember cautious optimism from most Spurs fans that AVB wouldn't allow the team/himself to make the same mistakes that cost us so dearly under Arry, we now had a manager who was far better tactically than Arry, and most importantly, a manager who was 100% focused on the job unlike Arry.

They still made up a 7 point lead on us at a late stage in the season, and this is an Arsenal team with not even 1 world class player.
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I think goals and expectations can change as the season goes on. As a quick (and perhaps extreme) example if a team picks up several long term injuries to key players I think that could change the situation enough that the goals expectations should perhaps also change. Similarly if a club signs a top class player in January it might be reasonable to expect more.

How many world class players Arsenal had in their team really doesn't say anything about how difficult an opponent they were for us to compete with in the league, apart from the games where we faced them of course. What we competed with was their points gained, not their players directly. They ended up on 73 points, that's what we had to compete with. If they ended up there with world class players or not really isn't that relevant as long as we're not talking about the games where we played against them. It wouldn't have made our performances any better or worse if Arsenal had ended up on 73 points with completely different players.
 
Jurgen the German said:
It was not a Arry question. It was a question about expectations changing and re-evaluating your goals as the season progresses. Lets say you start saying you want to be in the top 6, but by March you are in 12th place, do you not think you would have a rethink about what can be achieved?

The fact is, people DID SAY we now have a manager who is better tactically and will improve us.

I know you will only allow an Arry mention if it's a negative, but I don't see how I could have not mentioned him, you know, considering he was our last manager and football fans tend to compare current spurs teams to teams in the past.
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First off, your dig about my only 'allowing' Harry comments if they're negative is pathetic. And wrong. If you were a big man you'd apologize. I won't hold my breath. Secondly, your 'points ahead' comparison is so flawed it defies belief. You've been corrected by some on the balance of fixtures, but let me also add that last season, when we were 2-0 up at the deathstar, we were potentially THIRTEEN POINTS ahead of them. 13. That's quite a fudging slip! With two games left against mediocre opposition we needed 6 points to get 3rd. We couldn't do it. This season, in the close stretch, the game we failed to win/drew was away at Chelski. We won the 'mediocre oppo' ones...I could go on...
 
Each to there own etc etc but Levy has to shoulder some blame for a lack of movement on the striker front.. He has a lot of apologists on here but as to blew it that's not the case IMO but I also feel we could have aimed higher had we signed a striker that we have lacked for a while
We may have finished a point behind them but our goal difference was inferior by a distance to all above. But it's done know lets hope our business is done before end of August this year the sides all squared up and ready to go from game 1 .....COYS
 
Jurgen the German said:
Why is this season different from any other season? Are we not allowed to even ask questions as to why we didn't finish where we wanted to?
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Ask away...here;s your answer to this question. Wages.

My problem is that it feels like some postees were almost frothing with excitement at the thought of being able to HAVE this debate.
 
Kingdawson said:
yet you say absolutely nothing about the "hammering" i got about how i rated signings..in fact you added to it:ross::ross:
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No, I shared an opinion and, in another thread, attempted to show some politeness and cordiality towards you. What's the point? You're not interested. Stew in your misery mate, enjoy it! See you next August.
 
Excuse my last post sodding auto correct but as for the whole Arry debate he had a better side than AVB comfortably ...
 
thfcsteff said:
First off, your dig about my only 'allowing' Harry comments if they're negative is pathetic. And wrong. If you were a big man you'd apologize. I won't hold my breath. Secondly, your 'points ahead' comparison is so flawed it defies belief. You've been corrected by some on the balance of fixtures, but let me also add that last season, when we were 2-0 up at the deathstar, we were potentially THIRTEEN POINTS ahead of them. 13. That's quite a fudging slip! With two games left against mediocre opposition we needed 6 points to get 3rd. We couldn't do it. This season, in the close stretch, the game we failed to win/drew was away at Chelski. We won the 'mediocre oppo' ones...I could go on...
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So it doesn't matter that earlier in the thread I wrote that this year is not as bad as last year in terms of letting a lead slip?

So you don't consider a loss at home to Fulham and a draw away at Wigan bad results? Or an inexplicable defeat to Liverpool when we were in complete control of the game and somehow contrived to lose?

Somewhat hypocritical of you to single out KD for "hammering other posters" but it's fine for you to do the same to posters you don't agree with.
 
Jurgen the German said:
Why is this season different from any other season? Are we not allowed to even ask questions as to why we didn't finish where we wanted to?
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Quick question back at you Jurgen, not directly related to this post.

If you could go back in time to the point where we had that now much discussed 7 point gap, not knowing what you know now. If you looked at the remaining fixtures and someone offered that we could finish on 72 points, saying nothing about how Arsenal did in their fixtures, would you have taken it?
 
milo said:
I'm not sure that they did, Cazorla was a good signing, the rest I'm less sure about. I think that we had a bigger job to do in the summer than them and all of our summer signings have done well with the exception of Adebayor. I think that more importantly, we built a solid base for the team last summer, a couple of quality signings this summer and we will be significantly better.
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They had to replace their 30 goal a season striker and the PFA player of the year....and their best performing CM.
 
thfcsteff said:
Ask away...here;s your answer to this question. Wages.

My problem is that it feels like some postees were almost frothing with excitement at the thought of being able to HAVE this debate.
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Wages weren't a factor last season then? Or in 05/06? Or any other season?

I think you need to go over these new guidelines of the forum. Because none of us have called for the manager's head or the chairman's head, we've asked QUESTIONS and wondered how we could have maxmised our potential this season.
 
WestBerkshire said:
No mate I go to every game home and away and have to pay more and more every season for the privilege
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Which has nothing to do with Modric or VdV being sold or the competence of Levy.
You spending your money on tickets doesn't equal Spurs keeping players that won't play for us, or players that wouldn't be played.
 
thfcsteff said:
No, I shared an opinion and, in another thread, attempted to show some politeness and cordiality towards you. What's the point? You're not interested. Stew in your misery mate, enjoy it! See you next August.
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It's weird because i posted so many positive points about our season yet a few posters wanted to nit pick on my definition of the word 'signing' and how i rate our signings. I had to explain 4 or 5 times how i came up with my conclusions and it still wasn't accepted (someone even called my opinion silly). I thought when you finally posted you might explain that people are entitled to their opinion and others should back off but sadly that didn't come. Ah well.
 
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